© Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters
We are mostly seeing bullet wounds. In more than 95% of cases, bullet wounds are in the lower limbs, including knees. We also find some gunshot wounds to the abdomen and upper limbs.
What is the most impressive, in the patients we saw in the last three weeks, are the exit wounds of the bullets. When a bullet passes through a body, it always has an exit wound slightly wider than that the entry one. But in the patients we treat in our post-operative care clinics, the exit wound gives an indication of the unusual destruction of soft tissues and bones inside the wound.
The exit wound is disproportionately wider. It can be the size of a fist, or even of an open hand. These impressive lesions are obviously difficult to repair and often require subsequent grafts.
In half of the injured we've received, the bullet has reached the bone, causing multi-fragment fractures, which means the bone has literally been turned into dust. The bullets also cause multiple and irregular tears in the soft tissues (skin, tendons, muscles, nerves, arteries). This leads to devascularization, which is to say that the blood flow doesn't reach these tissues anymore, which in turn creates high risks of infections. If the bullet touches the sciatic nerve, it causes paralysis, which can be irreversible, as the repair of the lesions cannot be done in an emergency setting. When it is an arterial lesion, we face an immediate life-threatening risk, as well as a devitalization of the limbs, and therefore often an amputation.
Comment: See also the February interview by PressTV with Eva Bartlett:
PressTV interview with Eva Bartlett: 'Everything you've been told about Syria is a lie'