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Health

Pumping cold water inside the body could help after heart attacks

By Clare Wilson

2 January 2020

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Cooling the body from the inside could reduce damage after a cardiac arrest

Suwinai Sukanant/Alamy Stock Photo

Doctors often cool down people who have had a cardiac arrest or stroke to reduce brain damage, usually with water-filled blankets. But doing this with a device that circulates cold water through a tube down the throat to the stomach may have some advantages.

In a pilot study testing the device in people who had a cardiac arrest, doctors felt it was more convenient than blankets and patients reached the target temperature within about two hours.

While the study didn’t directly compare the…

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