Chest
Most penetrating injuries are chest wounds and have a mortality rate (death rate) of under 10%. Penetrating chest trauma can injure vital organs such as the heart and lungs and can interfere with breathing and circulation. Lung injuries that can be caused by penetrating trauma include pulmonary laceration (a cut or tear) pulmonary contusion (a bruise), hemothorax (an accumulation of blood in the chest cavity outside of the lung), pneumothorax (an accumulation of air in the chest cavity) and hemopneumothorax (accumulation of both blood and air). Sucking chest wounds and tension pneumothorax may result.
Penetrating trauma can also cause injuries to the heart and circulatory system. When the heart is punctured, it may bleed profusely into the chest cavity if the membrane around it {the pericardium) is significantly torn, or it may cause pericardial tamponade if the pericardium is not disrupted. In pericardial tamponade, blood escapes from the heart but is trapped within the pericardium, so pressure builds up between the pericardium and the heart, compressing the latter and interfering with its pumping. Fractures of the ribs commonly produce penetrating chest trauma when sharp bone ends pierce tissues.
Read more about this topic: Penetrating Trauma
Famous quotes containing the word chest:
“Man is head, chest and stomach. Each of these animals operates, more often than not, individually. I eat, I feel, I even, although rarely, think.... This jungle crawls and teems, is hungry, roars, gets angry, devours itself, and its cacophonic concert does not even stop when you are asleep.”
—René Daumal (1908–1944)
“There is hardly an American male of my generation who has not at one time or another tried to master the victory cry of the great ape as it issued from the androgynous chest of Johnny Weissmuller, to the accompaniment of thousands of arms and legs snapping during attempts to swing from tree to tree in the backyards of the Republic.”
—Gore Vidal (b. 1925)
“Gratitude is a fickle thing, indeed. A person taking aim presses the weapon to his chest and cheek, but when he hits, he discards it with indifference.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)