The Bloody: Medical Leeches

While doing community service the other night I managed to "snip" (if snip is even the right word) my left index finer--good thing I'm a righty! At which point the nail began to fill up with blood internally and the finger is all swollen...and now I have a cute little semi-creepy teddy bear band-aid to cover up the atrocity so as to not gross anyone out :\ it hurts.

So here's my inspiration that deals with blood---LEECHES!

Back in the day people used to think that if you were ill for a period of time it may be because you had bad blood flowing in your veins! So people would seek "doctors" who make an incision somewhere on your arm and allow you to bleed out a little bit. The normal body knows that bleeding a lot is bad so its natural instinct is to stop bleeding...here's where leeches come in!

Leeches may be placed on such open cuts to help you bleed out....OR in today's world, during various types of surgery (plastic surgery/reconstructive surgery). The leeches act as a natural anticoagulant which will keep you bleeding--up to 48 hrs after the leech has been removed actually!. This allows for dramatic decrease in post surgery swelling and congestion and also promotes healthy blood circulation to the wounded area.

you'd think that a process like this might hurt, but the leech actually produces its own anesthetic in its saliva so its quite painless. weird.

Here's a pretty cool site that offers info, advice, and leeches for sale!!