The Food and Drug Administration has approved a hemorrhagic shock detection device that U.S. Army researchers developed alongside scientists and engineers from the University of Colorado and Flashback Technologies.The Army Institute of Surgical Research said Wednesday it helped create a compensatory reserve index that works to detect whether a patient is on the verge of going into hemorrhagic shock.
CRI uses an algorithm designed to measure the compensatory reserve which represents the body’s capacity to compensate for blood loss.
“[The clearance] paves the way for fielding a compensatory reserve measurement device to give combat medics on the battlefield a tool to predict hemorrhagic shock, as well as emergency medical technicians in civilian medical settings,” said Victor Convertino, a USAISR senior scientist.
Convertino added CRI will help medics attend to wounded warriors in battlefiled conditions where there are “lots of noise, lots of adrenaline and not much equipment.”
USAISR noted traditional methods to take vital signs cannot detect when a patient is in danger of crashing or going into hemorrhagic shock which could lead to death due to blood loss.
