[at-l] Considerations.

[askowronek@mindspring.com (Amy)]

On Tuesday, August 13, 2002, at 09:12 PM, Steve Adams wrote:
>
>
> I realize peroxide is not used in hospital settings, but then hospitals
> have
> tremendous stores of medical material unlike the reduced supply hikers
> choose to carry.  I also had heard peroxide can damage tissue.  I've
> used it
> on myself, at home, however, seemingly without adverse effect.  I don't
> know
> how severe or extensive the damage "will" be or "can" be, nor the
> circumstances which determine whether "no damage", "some damage", or
> "severe
> damage" will result.

When I worked for a vet, the rule was that you could use peroxide around
a wound to clean it up, but not on the wound itself.   It's really good
at
eating up blood.

Once when I was in college, I fell and gouged my leg on a tree stump.
My cohorts held me down and poured peroxide (the only sterilizing agent
we had) on the wound.  Wow!  White hot pain.  I don't know if it made
things worse, but it sure didn't feel good.

> 7)  "The Polar Pure makes a saturated solution that only needs another
> charge of water to produce some more."
>
> Polar Pure advises, the iodine crystals diminish through usage.  And,
> that
> this diminution does not adversely affect its operation.  It seems
> intuitive
> that performance should suffer, however, as the agent is reduced.
> Somehow
> one iodine crystal doesn't seem equal to a bucketful of iodine crystals.

The reason it's still effective is that only so much iodine mixes into
the
water.  If you add more, it won't stay in the solution.  So a bucketful
of
iodine crystals won't make you a stronger solution than a little bit
of iodine crystals, assuming you haven't added a lake's worth
of water to the solution.

-amy