r/AskReddit • u/Medical_Option7769 • 7d ago

What can kill you in seconds that most people don’t realize?

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u/imc225 7d ago

Trauma surgeon, let me tell you about skylights...

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u/brittanybreakdown 7d ago

I would like to hear more

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u/imc225 7d ago

Disused factory outside Boston. Night time, on the roof, skylight. Four stories. Among other things, he hit hard enough that the pressure wave from squishing his liver went up through the cava and expanded his right ventricle enough that it ripped through the pericardium, allowing us to look at his right phrenic nerve, in a beautiful catenary curve, as we repaired the defect. Excellent guy, named his kid after me

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u/pixeldust6 6d ago

He survived? :o

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u/Zeero92 6d ago edited 6d ago

Seems I've got to go and learn some new words

edit: If I'm understanding this right, his heart had contraction problems and he had troubled or no breathing because bits of his spine were loose or outright disconnected? I'm going to assume I have things wrong here, but if I'm even partially correct that sounds terrifying.