-Doctor, my wife feels bad, help her please!!!
-What do you say! Even leeches could not help her?
-No. She ate only 3 of them and doesn't want to eat them more.
-What do you say! Even leeches could not help her?
-No. She ate only 3 of them and doesn't want to eat them more.
Leeches are very interesting worms, they have very special survival techniques, but in this blog I'm interested in their application as alternative medicine.
Normally leeches live in the ponds with stagnant water and use frogs, tadpoles and fishes as source of food. Adults prefere mammals that come to drink water.
Interesting is the behaviour of deers ecc. They surely know that leeches help them in their diseases, enter deeper in the water when they need the medicine and wait that more leeches attack them.
Probably, pre-hystorical people saw it and learned to use this healing method.
"Hirudo" is the latin word meaning "leech", that is why "hirudotherapy".
There are 3 species that are used for therapy: 2 species in Europe and 1 in Jappone.
To digest the blood leeches need about 2 weeks.
I have read about their use after surgery to re attach severed fingers, toes, and any where that a return path for the blood has not yet developed, is in medical use for patients that do not object.
ReplyDeleteYou are right. Thank you. Now, when you remembered me about it, yes there were documentaries about these use of leeches. And they say, it's a good method for after-surgery medication.
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