Children at home can easily get bruises and cuts from being mischievous. It is important for parents to learn some emergency techniques for handling such situations. Traditional Chinese medicine, such as the Five Spice Vine, can be used to treat external bleeding caused by injuries!
Image of the Five Spice Vine
[Treating External Bleeding with Five Spice Vine]
Internal use: Decoction, 4-6 qian (Chinese measurement); or soak in alcohol. External use: Mash and apply, or sprinkle powdered form.
①For treating snake bites, dog bites, and ulcers: Take an appropriate amount of Five Spice Vine leaves, mash them and apply externally.
②For treating rheumatism, numbness, injuries from falls, stomach pain, irregular menstruation, and vasculitis: Take Four to Six qian of Five Spice Vine roots and stems. Decoct and take orally, or soak in alcohol and consume.
③For treating external bleeding: Grind the root bark or leaves of Five Spice Vine into powder and apply to the wound. (This prescription is from the book "Selected Yunnan Chinese Herbal Medicine")
[Botanical Characteristics of Five Spice Vine]
Evergreen climbing shrub. Main root is thick and cylindrical. Leaves are alternate, subleathery, ovate-lanceolate to elongate-elliptic, 5-15 cm long, gradually pointed at the tip, blunt and round at the base, with nearly entire margins or sparse fine serrations.
Flowers are unisexual, axillary, 1-2 per leaf axil. Bracts are narrow triangular, about 1 mm long and wide. Outer tepals are small, triangular to nearly kidney-shaped, with margin hairs, while inner tepals are purple-red, oval to elliptic in shape. Stamens are nearly spherical.
The berries of Five Spice Vine are bright red when ripe. It flowers in the summer.
[First Aid for External Bleeding]
The technique of finger pressure to stop bleeding involves finding the pulsating blood vessel above the wound, closer to the heart, and pressing it tightly with your finger.
This is an emergency temporary method, and at the same time, other methods of stopping bleeding should be prepared. When using this method, the rescuer must be familiar with the pressure points for bleeding in different parts of the body.
Facial bleeding: Apply pressure to the facial artery between the angle of the jaw and the chin node with your thumb.
Anterior head bleeding: Apply pressure to the temporal artery above the temporomandibular joint.
Palm and back of the hand bleeding: Apply pressure on the radial artery, which is usually where we feel the pulse, located inside the wrist joint.
