Anal oxygen administration may save lives

https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2021/05/14/anal-oxygen-administration-may-save-lives

by helsinkiandrew • 5 years ago

201 148 5 years ago

economist.com

helsinkiandrew• 5 years ago

Archive.org link:

https://web.archive.org/web/20210514233706/https://www.econo...

This article reminded me of the bizarre source of the expression to "Blow smoke up your arse":

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/05/origin-expre...

_Microft• 5 years ago

For Firefox users:

Click reader mode and if the article is truncated there, press reload/F5 to reload while being in reader mode.

If Firefox does not offer the reader mode symbol for a website, you can force loading the website in reader mode by prepending about:reader?url= to the URL.

kalleboo• 5 years ago

Safari Reader Mode works too, for those on Mac/iOS

yboris• 5 years ago

archive.is link (full article):

https://archive.is/P7FvQ

nabla92• 5 years ago

The idiom ‘Blow Smoke Up Your Ass’ comes from tobacco enema. It seems that they almost got it right. Instead of smoke, oxygen should be used.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoke_enema

A tobacco smoke enema, an insufflation of tobacco smoke into the rectum, i.e. as an enema, was employed by the indigenous peoples of North America to stimulate respiration, injecting the smoke with a rectal tube.[1][2]
Later, Europeans emulated the Americans.[3] Tobacco resuscitation kits consisting of a pair of bellows and a tube were provided by the Royal Humane Society of London and placed at various points along the Thames.[4] European physicians furthermore employed these enemas for a range of ailments.[3

isatty• 5 years ago

I wish paywalled articles were banned from HN. Just because I can bypass it does not mean it’s worth the effort.

mateo1• 5 years ago

Unless you've been living under a rock, you should have noticed that most news publications are now paywalled. It's annoying but you can't just ban journalism. Blogs are dead, smaller websites are drowned by spam and new search engine "algorithms", and if you want a somewhat authoritative news piece you'll find yourself increasingly having to go behind a paywall. What would be nice to see is a universal micropayment system instead of ads and subscriptions, but after a decade or so of nobody implementing one, be glad you can still read what you can without having to spend $200 a month on a dozen subscriptions to cover your needs.

StavrosK• 5 years ago

There is one, called, err, coil. Coil.com

imwillofficial3• 5 years ago

This is exactly what Brave is somewhat successfully solving with BAT token.

frereubu• 5 years ago

The Economist is particularly easy though - just turn off JavaScript.

kblev• 5 years ago

Is there a tool to bypass paywalls?

abrookewood3• 5 years ago

On Firefox, I use Bypass Paywalls Clean

Garvey• 5 years ago

Pasting the article URL into the search over at archive.is seems to work for a lot of them

ullevaal2• 5 years ago

You could consider buying a subscription? I often see links on HN from places I subscribe to, so maybe the people who are voting are actually reading these articles and want to share and discuss them with the rest of the community?

presentation• 5 years ago

I just wish I didn’t need to buy separate subscriptions for each publication. If I’m only reading one off articles from each based on others’ recommendations the individual publication subscription doesn’t really express what I’m trying to achieve.

freshair2• 5 years ago

Just how many $5/mo subscriptions do you expect people buy, and how much does that all add up to per year?

The privilege here is real.

numpad0• 5 years ago

Quality journalism needs to be paid, though paid how is an open question

creshal5• 5 years ago

Making people buy a subscription for every single newspaper on the planet is definitely not a working solution.

gandalfian• 5 years ago

I hear some scurilious dogs put the link into outline.com and often get the article text. No comments though.

TaylorAlexander2• 5 years ago

I believe the liquid they are mentioning was featured in the movie The Abyss. It is painful for humans to breathe the liquid. But apparently giving you an enema with it works! Amazing.

raducu• 5 years ago

Makes me chuckle thinking of the next movie about future divers having tubes going into the rectum, not the mouth.

TaylorAlexander2• 5 years ago

To boldly go where no one has gone before!

Eyght• 5 years ago

I'm thinking that it could work as an emergency rectal oxygen enema for astronauts in distress. It ought to be very compact compared to pressured gas. Just push 'oxyjet' and don't forget to clench after.

ljm• 5 years ago

Two trapped divers only have one rebreather left between the two of them. The conscious diver clenches his butt as he removes the tube and plugs it into his partner's ass for a few seconds.

I'm getting Requiem for a Dream vibes from this.

lamontcg• 5 years ago

"Bend over and cough, Bud"

TheManInThePub• 5 years ago

I confess my first thought was mixing oxygen in a methane environment inside the body isn't ideal.

And this isn't a joke..... for example, cyclopropane is an excellent anaesthetic gas but no longer used due to the explosion risk. I believe (?) there was a case of a patients throat catching fire on the operating table.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inhalational_anesthetic#Gases

nabla92• 5 years ago

Mixing oxygen and methane is OK. Just don't introduce fire.

Methane in surgery can lead to flames when surgeons use electrocautery.

dtech• 5 years ago

I don't think the trace amounts of methane humans produce is enough to be any real danger...

jgalt212• 5 years ago

some frat boys beg to differ

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fart_lighting

amluto• 5 years ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intracolonic_explosion

sm0ss117• 5 years ago

If my choice is between definitely dying of boring old hypoxia and maybe dying in a cool explosion I know which one I'm picking.

But to be serious it's risk management and if the patient is definitely going to die of low oxygen then the patient having a risk of dying another way is still a lower risk.

pessimizer• 5 years ago

If I'm going to die from a small internal explosion, I'd rather it start at the other side of the tube. If my guts explode, I might still have a few more days to live.

clort• 5 years ago

The rectum is an interesting place. You can apparently also absorb water there, if you are severely dehydrated and unable to hold anything down (eg seasick). All you need, the saying goes, is a funnel and a friend..

full disclosure: I've not tried that!

ddxxdd2• 5 years ago

I have heard, from some corny Discovery Channel survival show, that the bottom can filter out salt from the water. So if you're surrounded by ocean with no fresh water, the bottom is the place to go.

stevula• 5 years ago

Wouldn’t the water seek isotonic equilibrium by moving to the side of the membrane with higher salt concentration? I don’t think that would work in your body’s favor.

doggodaddo782• 5 years ago

Absolutely not. Osmotic gradient. This is another reason not to watch TV and spend more time reading trustworthy sources.

andy_ppp• 5 years ago

I’m sure a plastic water bottle and a few yoga poses will suffice, go for it!

Clampower• 5 years ago

Your anus is not actually just a hole you can just pour things into. It seals itself. A funnel is of the essence when trying to pour liquids into the rectal cavity.

saberdancer• 5 years ago

Bear Grylls (I know) - showed that you can "drink" unsafe water by using funnel and a friend.

Not sure if this is accurate, it's a show after all, but it doesn't seem too crazy.

jvm_• 5 years ago

These people spent 37 days in a 9ft dinghy in the ocean. A ladder rung, plus the rain water mixed with turtle guts from the bottom of the boat saved their lives.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2009/aug/22/shipwre...

bob_theslob6462• 5 years ago

"What kept them going was grit, determination and turtle blood. "You have to knock it back quickly, otherwise it sets into blancmange," Douglas explains. Plus it's got an "aftertaste that makes you want to wretch". Their mother rubbed turtle oil on the salt-water boils, and tried to keep them all hydrated with makeshift enema tubes made from the rungs of a ladder. "It was her nursing background. She knew the water at the bottom of the dinghy was poisonous if taken orally because it was a mixture of rain water, blood and turtle offal. But if you take it rectally, the poison doesn't go through the digestive system."

Unbelievable!

NelsonMinar• 5 years ago

Works for alcohol too; keyword "butt chug". Can result in alcohol poisoning if you dose too much.

pantalaimon• 5 years ago

Works for other drugs too, it's known as boofing.

diplodocusaur• 5 years ago

Indeed! Fecal transplants are fascinating in their results too.

klmadfejno• 5 years ago

We're pouring liquids into our butts right? What's the friend for? Can't one do that on their own?

phone8675309• 5 years ago

It's really easier with a friend, especially the reach-around part.

skynet-90004• 5 years ago

Sounds useful for Ebola patients. Dehydration is apparently the thing that kills you the fastest. However, it could be very hazardous to your (very loving) friend.

tgsovlerkhgsel• 5 years ago

That's what PPE is for.

mkoubaa• 5 years ago

Does this mean you can absorb electrolytes from swimming in the ocean?

BrandoElFollito• 5 years ago

My wife had toxicology courses and one of the things the lecturer said it's that the rectum is interesting because of its absorbtion capacitors that are not hampered by the body.

Alcohol is one example, where you can die of intoxication, while if you have taken it the more traditional way your body would have reacted earlier to get it out.

hsbauauvhabzb• 5 years ago

I was under the impression ‘shelving’ was also a faster way to absorb alcohol and illicit drugs, hence why it’s popular among certain groups.

fnord77• 5 years ago

certain groups, such as supreme court justices

AdrianB1• 5 years ago

https://darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin2007-13.html

ptr2voidStar• 5 years ago

He earned the Award, no ifs ands or butts about it

abrookewood3• 5 years ago

Jokes aside, when would this be useful? I can't think of many situations where a patient wouldn't be able to breathe but was still alive. Some burn victims I guess?

jxf• 5 years ago

Severe lung obstruction, cases where intubation and tracheotomy are contraindicated, et cetera. It's not super common in the grand scheme of things, but then, neither are tracheotomies.

nigerian1981• 5 years ago

A previous HN article links to a paper which mentions this would be useful when there is a shortage of ventilators: https://www.cell.com/med/fulltext/S2666-6340(21)00153-7

kragen2• 5 years ago

Maybe some kind of worldwide pandemic of a respiratory infection with a significant fatality rate?

TheAdamAndChe• 5 years ago

Especially if ventilator capacity becomes saturated, this could possibly one day be a scalable alternative.

imwillofficial3• 5 years ago

Define “significant”

abrookewood3• 5 years ago

Ahh ... OK, I wasn't thinking clearly. I forgot about the lack of ventilators and was only thinking of the lack of oxygen recently reported in the news.

Symmetry• 5 years ago

They mention it being less traumatic than intubation so severe Covid-19 that can't be handled with just an oxygen mask would be one reason to administer this.

NtrllyIntrstd• 5 years ago

Butt at what cost!!!

NiceWayToDoIT2• 5 years ago

First thing I needed to check that I have not woke up in alternate reality and that today is not 1 April, after I remembered that some drug addicts use similar techniques to get high.

imwillofficial3• 5 years ago

Boofing some O2 for fun and profit

batekush• 5 years ago

Sir, I object. Not everyone who puts drugs in their butt is an addict. Some of us can plug a pill at a full-moon party every so often and go about the rest of our lives as usual thank-you-very-much.

NiceWayToDoIT2• 5 years ago

That was not clear enough on my side, let me find source:

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/thai-die/

So, some type of ultra cheap method to get high (but quite dangerous) is to get pump air with bicycle pump into the bottom. Article above.

DonHopkins5• 5 years ago

Just don't get hooked on coffee!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bznDjbQLzMo&ab_channel=TLC

At least you don't need to use those expensive tasty gourmet beans.

sn41• 5 years ago

Ah, the great suppository of wisdom.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oep_DPDy6xw

henearkr• 5 years ago

CPR is on the way to getting even more awkward...

rapnie• 5 years ago

But less covid risk I presume.

ddxxdd2• 5 years ago

More risk* [0]

[0] https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20210128/china-using-anal-sw...

nailer• 5 years ago

Oddly enough it also seems possible to feed people through their anus, it was a humiliation tactic used in Abu Ghraib

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/dec/09/cia-report-r...

seattle_spring• 5 years ago

There was a documentary[1][2] about this process.

[1] https://youtu.be/Ug5jVUv5V_A

[2] actually a South Park episode. NSFW

refactor_master• 5 years ago

The thing that surprised me most with this was the injectable perfluorocarbon emulsion. And it’s apparently even standard practice. Oxidation damage is actually the bigger risk.

And here I was, fearing pizza trays and non-stick pans.

bob_theslob6462• 5 years ago

Can you explain to me why you fear injectable perfluorocarbon emulsion?

maddyboo• 5 years ago

I think they are referring to PFASs [0] which have been a popular topic on HN for a while now. I’m not sure if the so-called perfluorocarbon emulsions in the original article would be classified as PFASs and/or carry the same risks, though.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per-_and_polyfluoroalkyl_subst...

flemhans• 5 years ago

Can this be used 'recreationally' or to promote faster healing, as an alternative for those (Justin Bieber) who sleep in Hyperbaric Oxygen Chambers?

SandroG• 5 years ago

It’s funny how the title of this post keeps changing.

jsdevtom• 5 years ago

I'd rather just die

pestatije2• 5 years ago

So they got O2 into the bloodstream. How does the CO2 get out of it?

pfdietz• 5 years ago

It also dissolves in PFCs. Presumably the PFCs are flushed through the gut and the CO2 is carried out by the outflow. Outside, I imagine the CO2 would come off when the PFC is aerated for reuse.

ralusek• 5 years ago

Also rectum.

stuaxo• 5 years ago

Via the lungs ?

zelienople• 5 years ago

We've been ventilating rats with anal perfluorocarbons for years now and all we've really learned is that ten percent of them seem to like it.

TchoBeer• 5 years ago

Wild. Citation?

Engineering-MD2• 5 years ago

I suspect this was a tongue in cheek comment

vsef• 5 years ago

From this classic: https://youtu.be/6tZar4wRP40

fasteddie31003• 5 years ago

Look up the old procedure of rectal fumigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_smoke_enema . There may be some actual benefits to blowing smoke up you ass.

ARandomerDude• 5 years ago

Anal oxygen? No thanks, I'll take the coffin.

evan_• 5 years ago

The latest season of The Expanse featured a character who had been exposed to vacuum revived by an injection of “hyperoxygenated blood” in the arm. This makes me think they just got the method of administration slightly wrong.

In the future spaceship air locks will include a box of emergency oxygen suppositories.

arch-ninja• 5 years ago

Obligatory futurama: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f6/40/e2/f640e25abd05e07442c6...

shkkmo• 5 years ago

Not at all. It is rather am extension of EMCO tech that exists today that can oxygenate blood externally before it is returned to the body.

skynet-90004• 5 years ago

Why don't we do that now instead of ventilating?

zoomablemind2• 5 years ago

"...They settled on liquid perfluorocarbons, which can absorb large amounts of oxygen and are often used as a blood substitute or to assist the ventilation of premature babies...."

Reminded me of the scene from an old underwater sci-fi flic (? was it 'The Abyss' https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0096754/), where the deep-divers had to learn how to 'breathe' the oxygenated liquid instead of air.

Speaking of liquid, there was also an example of 'fluid animation' (is it the term?), later also seen in Terminator 2 (the unkillable and self-reassembling T-1000) and other movies.

lazyant• 5 years ago

Yes it was "The Abyss", see the rat scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6hw4dGhm8Y

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Abyss "The breathing fluid used in the film actually exists but has only been thoroughly investigated in animals.[5] Over the previous 20 years it had been tested on several animals, who survived. The rat shown in the film was actually breathing fluid and survived unharmed"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_breathing

sitkack2• 5 years ago

I could see a low pressure breathing fluid being advantageous for space travel. I wonder how long a mammal could live in that environment. Now if we can just retain our gills.

danpalmer• 5 years ago

The idea of breathing one of these heavily oxygenated liquids has been around for a while and I believe even tested on live animals. I can’t remember if it was tested on humans.

In theory it all works and has great benefits for breathing in high pressure environments. In reality I believe the issues encountered were: getting past the feeling of drowning at the beginning, needing very strong lungs for even normal breathing rates, and then transitioning back to air being problematic.

zoomablemind2• 5 years ago

...transitioning back to air being problematic.

Yeah, this seems to be quite an obstacle, giving the fact how long it may take for lungs to fully expectorate the mucus after a bout of pneumonia.

nradov• 5 years ago

Liquid breathing has never been successfully tested in humans, or any large animal. It doesn't scale up well from small animals. The work of breathing is too high. It might be feasible at some point with external mechanical ventilation.

l3s2d• 5 years ago

This reminded me of scene, from a sci-fi book (Arthur C. Clarke, maybe), about a naked race on the moon. The racers filled their lungs with some sort of oxygenated liquid.

data_ders• 5 years ago

I hope “boofing” becomes the medical term for this but spelled “bo2fing” for short.

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Boofing

skynet-90004• 5 years ago

tl;dr: researchers discovered that pumping liquid perfluorocarbons, which can absorb large amounts of oxygen, directly into the anus of the tested mammals (not humans, yet) can help them survive even in low oxygen (or even completely deprived of oxygen, for 4 times longer) environments.

The idea is that this will enable a less invasive way of ventilation for oxygen-deprived patients (i.e., covid-19) than tracheal intubation. It's even possible a patient could be ventilated from (pardon) both ends simultaneously.

stephenr• 5 years ago

Is this a real thing or is someone just blowing hot air up my ass?

kugutsumen• 5 years ago

David Blaine's secret

Anal oxygen administration may save lives

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