U of A team builds rewarming device for frostbite treatment [Video]

University of Alberta researchers have created a device they believe could significantly reduce the number of frostbite cases that end in amputation.

The Frostbite Rewarming Device was inspired by data that suggested few of Alberta’s growing number of frostbite injuries are being rewarmed appropriately, says Matthew Douma, a critical care adjunct professor who leads the Alberta Frostbite Care Collaborative.

There are multiple reasons for this, he knows from 16 years as an emergency department nurse, whether it be that an injured person is homeless and attends a hospital late, or that the most common way of rewarming an injury – a nurse manually supplying a series of buckets of warm water – is inefficient and imprecise.

“We didn’t have a solution that was informed by the human factors or the workflow,” Douma told CTV News Edmonton in a recent interview.

But effective rewarming can help preserve tissue and reduce the need for amputations and tissue grafts, …