Henry Heimlich has died | Hacker News Reader

Henry Heimlich has died

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112 pointshappy-go-lucky24 comments

""As a young surgeon, Dad was the first American to devise and perform a total organ replacement. Later, he came up with a device that saved thousands of soldiers' lives during the Vietnam War. The Heimlich Chest Drain Valve is still used worldwide for patients undergoing chest surgery."

Clearly Heimlich should be known for more than the HM.

It's also mechanically incredibly simple[0], to the point where you can fairly easily DIY it (or a variation of it) if you ever need it.

My dad (a doctor) did so once decades ago, while working in a hospital in Ghana. His patient was a man with a collapsed lung. IIRC, he took a surgeon glove, cut off the tips of two fingers, attached one to a tube, and made a knot in the wrist (so it became kind of like a balloon with two openings). The tube was attached to the lung, to drain fluid. The glove was partially submerged in a bucket of water, so it now functioned like a valve: when the patient breathed out, air and fluid could escape from the glove. When he breathed in, the suction plus water pressure would "seal off" the glove.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flutter_valve

"It's also mechanically incredibly simple"

Holy cow, hats off to your Dad for this. Everything is simple in theory, putting it into practice on a critically ill person is something else.

I am by no means denigrating the man's accomplishments, he certainly was a great man. However, it is worth noting that he became something of a quack, advocating that the maneuver could cure various ailments unrelated to choking.[0] The linked Radio Lab episode provides a full picture of the man and is very interesting.

[0] http://www.radiolab.org/story/273532-heimlich/

There is also some really weird stuff with his kids, where at least one of his sons and the son's wife consider him to be a total fraud. Gelman wrote about it here (including link to son's page) http://andrewgelman.com/2016/10/09/heimlich/

From the comments section:

http://andrewgelman.com/2016/10/09/heimlich/#comment-325017

> Truth is not only stranger than fiction, it is stranger than truth. Andrew’s next-to-last sentence links to:

> “(The Heimlich manoeuvre) has never been used in Australia. Despite the claims of the extremely charismatic Dr. Heimlich, Australian resuscitation experts believe that there isn’t enough scientific evidence to support its use. So how does a medical procedure become so widely adopted without any serious scientific evidence? — The Heimlich manoeuvre by Aviva Ziegler, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, July 27, 2009”

I'm on mobile so am not able to look it up easily, but I'm assuming there are some experiments to verify beyond anecdotes whether the maneuver works, right?

Also, what do Australians use in lieu of it?

According to Wikipedia:

In some areas, such as Australia, authorities believe that there is not enough scientific evidence to support the use of abdominal thrusts and their use is not recommended in first aid. Instead, chest thrusts are recommended.

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

This was on HN some time ago - apparently there is some sort of research that states that patting/whacking on the back was in fact as affective as Heimlich manoeuvre.

The general recommendation is now to start with 5 Back Blows then 5 Abdominal Thrusts (the Heimlich), repeated as necessary.

Mayo Clinic: http://www.mayoclinic.org/first-aid/first-aid-choking/basics...

European Resuscitation Council: http://ercguidelines.elsevierresource.com/european-resuscita...

Australia (and New Zealand) Resuscitation Councils: http://www.nzrc.org.nz/training/ECI/anzcor-guidelines-2016-u...

In the case of Australia/New Zealand the recommendation is to do 5 Back Blows then 5 Chest Thrusts. My understanding is that it's believed to be similarly effective but has less risk of causing internal injuries.

Especially if the object still has air passing by it since the Heimlich manoeuvre only works if there is a tight seal.

A secretary at my workplace had a piece of pork rib stuck but there was still air getting by. An ambulance was called and the medic walked over and slapped her back to remove the food.

Not sure why, but here in Brazil we only see this maneuver in American movies ad TV shows, no here uses it or would even know it has a name or how to perform it.

Standard advice in Australia is:

> Bend the person well forward and give five back blows with the heel of your hand between their shoulder blades – checking if the blockage has been removed after each blow.

> If unsuccessful, give five chest thrusts by placing one hand in the middle of their back for support and the heel of the other hand on the lower part of their breastbone – checking if the blockage has been removed after each thrust.

From https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/conditionsandtrea...

Note that thrusts may be used if simpler measures fail but these are chest thrusts, not abdominal as in Heimlich, and the person should be leaning forward, not held upright.

In Med school here (Australia) we are specifically cautioned against using the Heimlich manoeuvre and we're told to use the above techniques

My wife is a US trained physician and she saved someone using the Heimlich maneuver, so there's that.

We don't just not teach the Heimlich manoeuvre, in every first aid course I've attended, they very clearly and explicitly instruct you to not use the Heimlich.

The Heimlich maneuver is one of those things that's much more recent than I imagined. (Another is the bicycle, the modern design of which is only from the late 1800s, just a few decades before the automobile and airplane.)

Wow, you aren't kidding. I had imagined it to be an invention of the 1950s, not the seventies.

See also: Ciabatta Bread. I always assumed it had deep historical roots in Italian culinary tradition, but turns out it was invented by some Italian baker in the 1980s who was envious of the French and their baguettes.

Wow, thanks for the example. It turns out ciabatta is about the same age as the bakery I get it from (!).

Here's an interesting fact, he used his own move for the first time earlier this year[1].

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11787093

First, a fun fact:

I was in a class teaching the Heimlich Maneuver yesterday afternoon. The teacher notes that Heimlich is, in fact, still alive at 96 years old. Not five minutes later someone holds up their iPhone -- "hey, I just got the craziest news alert..."

Second:

According to the same teacher, as well, some lawsuits on the part of Heimlich or his family have caused the American Heart Association to now recommend using the term "abdominal thrusts" instead of "Heimlich maneuver." Which the teacher considered sad because it would cause the name of the doctor to be forgotten over time. I'm having a hard time finding an online reference to this -- so curious if anyone else has heard something along these lines.

This short interview (1m 20s) about Heimlich saving another guest at the nursing home he was living in is wonderful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3yWQ50MnBM

Chalk another one up to 2016.

Black bar?

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