Vessels of truth: cure for ischemia will accelerate recovery from gunshot wounds 1.5 times

Russian doctors have proposed a method that allows 1.5 times faster recovery after surgery for patients with gunshot wounds. Such injuries are often accompanied by vascular disorders, which leads to the development of severe complications. To minimize these consequences at the postoperative stage, doctors used regulatory peptides, biologically active substances that were previously used primarily in the treatment of chronic ischemia. According to experts, they help to restore blood vessels, reduce pain and form new blood pathways. Experts note that the technique looks promising, but requires further testing on a larger number of patients.

Recovery after surgery

Doctors from the Burdenko Main Military Clinical Hospital and the Vishnevsky National Medical Research Center for Surgery have developed an approach that significantly facilitates and accelerates the recovery of patients after surgical treatment of gunshot wounds. The technique used drugs with vasoactive peptides, which are traditionally used in the treatment of chronic ischemia. These substances have an angioprotective effect — they help strengthen blood vessels and improve their function. The use of such drugs in the postoperative period has already shown positive results in a number of clinical cases, which were described in a scientific article in the journal Surgery.

— After surgery, patients need medical support with biologically active substances to improve their overall well-being. Gunshot and shrapnel wounds lead to vascular damage and a cascade of disorders, and to restore their function, we used peptide preparations. According to our estimates, this accelerated healing by at least one and a half times. But in order to accurately assess the effectiveness, further research is needed on a wider sample," Konstantin Petrov, senior resident of the Vascular Surgery Department at the Center for Cardiovascular Surgery, Burdenko Academy Main Military Clinical Hospital of the Russian Ministry of Defense, told Izvestia.

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So, in one case, a peptide drug was prescribed to a patient who, while in an armored car, came under fire and received shrapnel wounds to his right shin, left elbow and hip. As well as a patient with a gunshot shrapnel wound to both lower extremities, accompanied by damage to the femoral arteries and veins on the right. In the early postoperative period, doctors used angioprotective therapy with vascular polypeptide preparation, which was administered intramuscularly at a dosage of 5 mg. Injections were performed twice a week for five weeks.

"The presented clinical cases demonstrate the need for an integrated approach to the treatment of patients with gunshot wounds to the vessels of the extremities. In the postoperative period, such patients need angioprotective therapy," the authors of the scientific article noted.

Prospects for the use of drugs for ischemia in gunshot wounds

We are talking about gunshot wounds accompanied by vascular damage, explained Ekaterina Kazharskaya, medical adviser to Peptidpro. In such cases, patients were prescribed a peptide angioprotector. According to her, this is a unique Russian drug based on regulatory peptides of cattle. It is a complex of biologically active substances aimed at restoring the vascular wall.

— In patients, a vessel collapses after injury or, for example, a tourniquet was applied to stop bleeding and all nearby tissues experience oxygen deficiency. This has a bad effect on both the tissues themselves and the nerve fibers. Patients often have severe pain syndrome after vascular restoration. According to the observations of surgeons, this is also stopped by the drug. It is also important that additional blood supply pathways are formed after damage to compensate for the lost ones. The polypeptide preparation stimulates the formation of new blood vessels, promotes the restoration of their walls and reduces ischemic tissue damage after injury," she said.

According to Pavel Kruglov, a vascular surgeon and military doctor, the use of peptide drugs may be advisable as an adjunct to conservative therapy in mine-explosive lesions. At the same time, he stressed that in order to obtain accurate conclusions, larger-scale studies are needed to assess whether patients have a reduced risk of developing venous insufficiency.