They used damage control surgery usually followed in wars
AK-47, AK-56 and M5, the machine gun that the National Security Guards (NSG) has, are weapons commonly used in war or conflict zones where insurgency needs to be tackled. Wounds inflicted by these are different from those inflicted by regular bullets fired from a 303 rifle or other guns commonly used by the police.
Many doctors in the hospitals — St George, GT, Bombay and JJ — who treated injured victims of the terrorist attack on November 26 night, had never seen injuries caused by an AK-47 assault rifle before, and had a tough time trying to save the patients.
“We had not seen such injuries because Mumbai had never seen these weapons being used, except perhaps in the underworld,” said Dr Sanjay Chatterjee, consultant surgeon, Bombay Hospital, who was on duty that night. “I had seen bullet injuries in the past, but never the ones from an AK-47,” agreed Dr Sagar Sakle, chief medical officer
of the hospital.
“When a person is shot, a lot depends on where he is shot and whether the shot was fired at point blank range or from a distance. The nature of the injury also depends on the type of weapon, as that is what determines the speed and the size of the bullet,” said Dr Chatterjee.
He further said: “The size of an AK-47 bullet is bigger than what we had seen so far. We also noticed that there was a cavitation injury (disruption of tissues) at the entry point of the bullet. This is not the case with bullet wounds from other weapons. AK-47 bullets have created a sort of ‘mini-blast’ at the entry point,” he said.
Doctors used a technique called damage control surgery — usually used in war zones.
“We check the extent of injury, and also which injury is most likely to prove fatal. We focus only on it and stitch the wound back — all of it in less than an hour. The idea is to stabilise the patient first, and perform another surgery after a few hours to save another organ,” explained Dr Chatterjee.
“A 303 bullet goes straight, however, an AK-47 bullet is like a mushroom — the tissue damage it causes is exponentially more than what a 303 can do,” said Dr Roy Patankar, gastro intestinal surgeon, Joy Hospital.
