New technology – in the form of a small magnetic extractor – is helping to save lives on the battlefield and changing the face of frontline medicine in the Ukraine, reports the BBC.
The surgeons there believe the device could be helpful in other war zones, too.
From his pocket, Serhiy Melnyk pulls out a small rusty shard wrapped neatly in paper, which he holds up. “It grazed my kidney, pierced my lung, and my heart,” said the Ukrainian serviceman.
Traces of dried blood are still visible on the shrapnel from a Russian drone that became lodged in his heart while he was fighting in eastern Ukraine.
“I didn’t even realise what it was at first; I thought I was just short of breath under my body armour,” he said. “They had to extract shrapnel out of my heart.”
With the rise of drone warfare in Ukraine, these injuries are becoming more common. Drones often carry weapons and materials that fragment and cause more complex shrapnel wounds.
Ukrainian military medics say shrapnel wounds now make up to 80% of battlefield trauma.
Untreated, Serhiy’s injury would have been fatal.
“The fragment was as sharp as a blade. Doctors said it was a large piece, and that I was lucky to survive,” he saif reflectively.
But it wasn’t just luck that saved him, it was a new piece of medical technology. A magnetic extractor.
Small incision
Cardiovascular surgeon Serhiy Maksymenko shows footage of the metal fragment trapped in Serhiy’s beating heart before it is delicately removed by a thin magnet-tipped device.
“You don’t have to make large cuts in the heart,” he said. “I just make a small incision, insert the magnet, and it pulls out the shrapnel.”
In just one year, Maksymenko’s team has performed more than 70 successful heart operations with the device.
The development of these extractors came after frontline medics highlighted the urgent need for a safe, fast, minimally invasive way to remove shrapnel.
The development was driven by Oleh Bykov, who used to work as a lawyer. Since 2014 he has been supporting the army as a volunteer. He met medics on the front line and from his conversations, the magnetic extractors were created.
The concept isn’t new. Magnets were used for removing metal from wounds as far back as the Crimean War in the 1850s. But Oleh’s team modernised the approach, creating flexible models for abdominal surgery, micro-extractors for delicate work, and high-strength tools for bones.
Operations have become more precise and less invasive. The magnet can be run along the surface of a wound to draw fragments out. Surgeons then make a small incision and the piece is removed.
Holding a slim pen-shaped tool, Oleh demonstrates its power by lifting a sledgehammer with the magnetic tip.
His work has been commended by other war medics including David Nott, a veteran of war zones around the world.
“In war, things get developed which would never have been thought of in civilian life,” he says, adding that fragmentation wounds have increased, due to the changing face of war.
He says looking for shrapnel in patients is like looking for a needle in a haystack – it is not always successful and delays treatment of other casualties.
Searching for fragments manually can be dangerous and requires bigger incisions that can cause more bleeding, “so to be able just to simply find them using a magnet is ingenious”.
What began as a field tool has now been rolled out across Ukraine, with 3 000 units distributed to hospitals and frontline medics, like Andriy Alban, who says he has come to rely on the device.
He often works while under fire, in trenches or makeshift outdoor clinics, and sometimes without local anaesthetic.
“My job is to save lives – bandage wounds and get soldiers evacuated,” he says.
There has been no official certification of the magnetic extractor.
The Ukrainian Health Ministry says medical devices must comply fully with technical regulations. However, in exceptional cases, such as martial law or a state of emergency, the use of uncertified devices is allowed to meet the needs of the military and security forces.
At the height of war, there's no time for red tape, mastermind Oleh says. “These devices save lives. If someone thinks my actions are a crime, I’ll take responsibility. I’m even prepared to go to jail if it comes to that. But then all the doctors who use these devices should be incarcerated too,” he adds half jokingly.
David Nott agrees that certification is not a top priority for now and believes the device could prove helpful in other war zones, such as Gaza.
“In war, it’s not really necessary. You only do the things which are important to save lives.”
BBC article – 'They took shrapnel from my heart' – the magnets saving lives in Ukraine (Open access)
See more from MedicalBrief archives:
‘War crime’ accusations over attacks on Ukraine hospitals and civilians
Syria’s shadow doctors heal as conflict kills
Injectable sponges for battlefield
Religion squeezes out medicine as Taliban take control of Afghan hospitals