Blood Clot Fiber Study May Aid Treatment

Associated Press ^ | August 3, 2006 | Lauran Neergaard

[Zakeet]

The fibers that make up blood clots are more elastic than rubber bands and stretchier than spider webs. They're even tougher than doctors suspected - a discovery that could lead to improved treatment of heart attacks and strokes.

Understanding how much these fibers can be stretched before they break should point to better ways to bust up blood clots on demand.

Made of a protein called fibrin, the fibers are stretchier than any other naturally occurring ones, even super-stretchy spider silk, concluded researchers who rigged up a double-microscope to measure how tough the tiny strands - 1,000 times smaller than a human hair - really are.

[IslandJeff]

Terrific and promising research. But (pet peeve vent time): 1,000 times smaller than a human hair

"x times smaller" only reveals the ignorance of the writer. Why not "1/1000th the size (diameter? circumference?) of a human hair"? Petty, I realize (in the larger scheme of things), but words have meaning.

[SkyDancer]

I carry a bit of clumping kitty litter in case of major hurts on hikes ... also fem.napkins in the first aid kit helps on larger wounds .....

[Rte66]

I don't have the stomach to click the link and read the rest of the story, because just knowing there are fibers in blood clots is making me sick - BUT, having said that - couldn't this mean that those strange fibers growing out of people's skin in that new disease that some think is a hoax, might be coming out of blood clots? Just askin'.

[annie laurie]

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