The Prepper Broadcasting Network - MEDICAL MONDAY: Riot Survival & Suture Choices - Dr. Bones & Nurse Amy

Episode Date: February 16, 2026

There are no two voices that taught preppers more about survival medicines than Dr. Bones and Nurse Amy. DoomandBloom.netBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/prepper-broadcasting-network--3295097/support.BECOME A SUPPORTER FOR AD FREE PODCASTS, EARLY ACCESS & TONS OF MEMBERS ONLY CONTENT!Red Beacon Ready OUR PREPAREDNESS SHOPThe Prepper's Medical Handbook Build Your Medical Cache – Welcome PBN FamilySupport PBN with a Donation Join the Prepper Broadcasting Network for expert insights on #Survival, #Prepping, #SelfReliance, #OffGridLiving, #Homesteading, #Homestead building, #SelfSufficiency, #Permaculture, #OffGrid solutions, and #SHTF preparedness. With diverse hosts and shows, get practical tips to thrive independently – subscribe now!Newsletter – Welcome PBN FamilyGet Your Free Copy of 50 MUST READ BOOKS TO SURVIVE DOOMSDAY

It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine. This is the hour of doom. Nope, and bloom. That's right. There's always a little bloom and every hour of doom. That's right. I would say. And with that, friends and neighbors, welcome to the Doom and Bloom Survival Medicine podcast,

a Station of Serenity in a seditious world. I'm Joe Alton, MD, that old Dr. Bones of Survival Top 50s, Reader Choice, website doom and bloom.net where you'll find gosh, 1,200 articles, podcasts, videos, and I don't know, random comments on medical preparedness. That's right. And I am

Nurse Amy. Actually, I'm Amy Alton. I'm an advanced registered nurse practitioner and a certified nurse midwife. Here to be coddled and, I don't know, cuddled and just just snuggled and held warmly.

What are you trying to say, Mr. and calmly and tranquilly in our arms. Forget it. We're going to give you the... What for? The what for. Gosh darn it. And we are indeed the kind of folks that are willing to do that.

We do have active medical licenses. You're not just talking to anybody. You're talking to actual medical professionals. But you know what? That doesn't mean that we don't go outside. Not outside the house. Although we're not supposed to in some places. We literally don't go outside the house.

But sadly. We're talking about going outside the conventional medical wisdom. We do do that. Sometimes we're not just outside, but not even in the same orbit around the same planet as the conventional medical wisdom. Now, that's what it might take to be medically self-reliant. But you know what? Before we start, you better listen to this. All information and opinions voice on the Survival Medicine podcast are for entertainment purposes only.

And do not represent medical advice for anything other than post-reveillance. apocalyptic settings. We strongly urge our audience to seek modern and standard medical care wherever and whenever it is available. That's right. Don't listen to us. We're just the cry of a loon on a lonely lake in Upper Ontario or somewhere. Where are the loons?

I don't think we have loons down here for it. No, you're the loon. Maybe a faint little voice. And that makes me Mrs. Loon. There you go. That's right. You know that the dollar, Canadian dollar, I think it's called the loony, the coin is. Oh, that's hilarious.

And I think if it's a $2 coin, Canadian dollar coin, I think it's called a toony. A tunie. Yeah. A loony tunie. I've heard that. I could be right. I could be wrong. So is that where they got loony tunes?

Maybe. All right. That's a story to be researched. Well, guys out there, if we didn't have enough reason for us to keep to our houses to avoid COVID-19, Well, now we have rioting in dozens of major cities throughout the United States. It makes you want to live in the country, that's for sure. Yes. But unfortunately, our kids don't live anywhere near the country.

They live in major cities. We have a daughter in Brooklyn. We have a daughter in Chicago. I don't know how I ended up with that. Well. You have a son who's moving to Chicago in 10 days. That's right. He's also moving to Chicago.

I have another one down here in the metroplex of, Fort Lauderdale and Miami and that area. And I'll tell you, this is where the trouble is. So it would be better to be somewhere up on the top of a mountain in Gatlinburg, which ordinarily we would be right now. But that's not in the cards for this year. What can I tell you? Maybe fall.

Maybe fall. Maybe everything will be straight now by then. I hope so. So I should be allowed to leave our house. Right. We're supposed to not have curfews and be banned from second homes. Please world get back to normal. It is a mess.

But I do want to talk to people a little bit about what's going on. You know, protests are still going on at least as of the time of this recording, and maybe a little less violent, I hope. But we've seen that it just takes one event to set the entire country of fire. And you need to know how to protect yourself in these kinds of situations if you wind up being caught in the middle of one of these things. Right. Safety first. Here's some of my thoughts with regards to how to keep safe in an area of civil unrest.

As a free speech advocate, I support the people's right to protest and make their opinions heard. Unfortunately, demonstrations in the U.S. these days are becoming more frequent and violent. After a short break due to the pandemic, people are again out in the streets, some with legitimate concerns, and others with bad intentions. I've spoken about this before, but it hit home recently when the farm. on the bottom floor where my daughter lives was broken into and looted this is in the city of chicago luckily no fires were set she has a golden retriever though and dogs need to be walked hence i worry how can she stay safe in such an environment i haven't been to a protest since the vietnam era and in that i was inadvertently caught in a wave of people escaping a barrage of pepper gas just on the way to class back then i was fit enough to high-tail it out of there today well i don't know not so much there's so much civil unrest in the news these days that any major city can become a Tinderbox. Therefore, it's a good idea to have a riot survival strategy, whether you plan to be there or just a bystander. It goes without saying

that your objective should be to stay away from where the violence is occurring. Rule number one, if you walk smack dab into a demonstration, things can get dicey pretty fast. Therefore, when it comes to going to areas of civil unrest, ask yourself to question, is this trip necessary? I've written a lot about situational preparedness, and that mindset will serve you very well. A situationally prepared person should always be in a state of yellow alert. Yellow alert simply means being calmly and vigilantly aware of your surroundings and the people around you. When a person or group of people behave strangely, take note and avoid them. Large groups tend to exhibit what we call herd behavior.

They tend to do what other people around them are doing. This is because those who join the group in the behavior figure, well, if several other people are doing something, it must be worthwhile, or they wouldn't be doing it. I mentioned in my active shooter videos that if 50 people around you drop to the ground at the sound of a gunshot, you're probably going to do about the same thing without even thinking, even though it's probably better to run the opposite direction from the sound. There are aspects of behavior in civil unrest that change the rules of polite society. The greater anonymity that exists within a group makes a person believe that they can act a certain way and not have the same consequences than if they were acting

alone. For example, if someone in a large group is looting a store, they might believe there's less chance of getting caught, and they might feel less personal responsibility about their action. Always mentally map out routes of escape as you walk along. Where's the nearest side street? Is there a building or subway entrance that will take you out of harm's way? If you don't know the area, move away to where you do know the lay of the land. If you have to make your way through a crowd, make sure you stay on the fringes. Don't get caught in the middle of masses of people surging away or towards the violence. If you do, they're deciding your movements, not you.

Don't underestimate the state of confusion or even panic that can exist in a large group. Say a crowd of people incite law enforcement to use tear gas. When the crowds run to escape the gas cloud, they could run right into you. In extreme cases, some folks could even get trampled by large numbers of folks that are trying to move quickly in the same direction. Having said that, unless everyone else is rushing in your direction, don't run yourself unless you have no choice. If you're the only person moving in high gear in a crowd, you will attract unwanted attention. That doesn't mean you should mosey out of there, walk fast and purposefully around the corner or to a safe spot. Avoid being caught against walls, fences, blockades, and other solid objects if you can.

It could get crushed by masses of protesters. And by the way, avoid confrontations with these people. Don't engage in political discussions, and it's probably not a good idea to wear your convictions on your t-shirt or your hat. In the wrong place and the wrong time, this can get you attacked, pepper-sprayed, beaten, or even killed. It's a sad statement on today's society, but it's true. It pays to be inconspicuous. This may be difficult if you're six foot eight inches tall, but otherwise, well, do your best to be what we call the gray man. You should also have a bandana handy.

This is a classic survival supply. mask, per se, but most people have a face covering in these pandemic times, so might as well use it. It's better than nothing at riots where tear gas is sprayed. Now, some advocate soaking the cloth with lemon juice or apple cider vinegar to counteract tear gas, but I'm not sure. I think that this may just be an urban myth. We're sneakers or other footwear that will allow you the most mobility. The only women wearing high heels are going to be reporters. Full-hearty reporters is that. Make sure you're well-closed so that your skin is protected. You're going to need to wash clothes thoroughly that might have been exposed to tear gas or other chemicals, or you might have to throw them away.

Be aware of the movement of law enforcement officers. But do not approach them. Their job is tough enough, and they may be dealing with a hostile confrontation at the moment. Besides, they're not going to be able to hear you probably above the roar of the crowd. If you're with friends, stay together. If you can't, agree on a meeting place beforehand in case you wind up. getting separated moving through the crowd. In areas where civil unrest is rife, carry some cold water, milk, or diluted liquid and acid like maylocks, or even baking soda

solution, which is, by the way, recommended by the people who make mace, if you're sprayed with tear gas. You want to move quickly into an area of fresh air and pour the liquid on your face, especially your eyes. Drink it if you were sprayed in the mouth. Milk or liquid and acid are thought by some to work better than water, but there's no hard data one way or another on. this. Baking soda solution, by the way, should not be taken with a full stomach. The good news is that even if you do little or nothing, the effects of tear gas will resolve over time. If you're involved in a protest or traveling through any area experiencing violence, you should carry a basic medical kit that will help to treat injuries and stop bleeding. I know where you can get one. I used to say that

it's likely you're never going to get caught in a civil unrest event, but you know what? I'm no longer so sure. Having a solid plan of action in these troubled times just makes common sense. You should prepare for man-made disasters just as you should for hurricanes, tornadoes, and earthquakes. Well, with all the violence that we've seen out there, I'm sure there are quite a few people. I'll bet a lot of law enforcement officers that wound up getting hit by a brick or other projectile and needed stitches. Lacerations of the skin, these are things that can occur off the grid scenarios that are related to survival as well, but there's no hospital there that's ready to close the wound. So it's up to the family medic to figure out what to do. That person needs to have a

working knowledge of not just how to throw a stitch, but when a wound should stay open, when a wound should be closed, because of, let's say, risk of infection. A lot of wounds in outdoor situations are going to be dirty, and so you really have to work through a few factors before you decide to close a wound. We've discussed this topic on this program before, actually a number of times to sew or not to sew, to stitch or not to stitch, but you have to know if you're going to do that, if you're actually going to close a wound, and you have learned the rudimentaries of what you need to do to close a wound, what type of suture materials are going to be best for the purpose. There are a lot of animals that are, well, not the type of.

that really need much stitching. They have an exoskeleton as a protective covering. So this includes things like insects and spiders and shrimps and crabs, things like that. Humans, however, we have our skeletons on the inside, so we depend on the largest organ of the body, that's our skin. Instead, skin represents an armor that protects the body and the skeleton from invasion by debris and microbes. But a breach in that armor increases a chance of infection that could spread throughout the entire body. We call it sepsis, and it can become life-threatening. So as such, there are circumstances where a break in the skin should be closed with materials known as sutures, things we talked about before. The decision to close, not automatic,

remember that. Very, very important to know some important factors as to when you close and when you don't close. We'll talk about that in future shows. We've talked about it in previous shows. You can certainly look them up in archives. But once that decision is made, the correct choice of suture material really impacts the strength and effectiveness of the healing process. Now, if you had a perfect suture, if you had an optimal suture, it would be sterile, it would be easy to use, it would be strong enough to hold the wound edges together, it would be able to retain strength for whatever time was needed for the wound to heal, it would be unlikely to cause infection or tissue reaction or significant scarring, and it would be reliable in its everyday use

for every type of wound. Now, pretty much all of you out there know that I've done quite a lot of suturing in my day over decades of... Thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands. Surgical procedures and things like that, but what they might not know is that you have a great deal of experience suturing as well, don't you? I do, absolutely. And tell me a little bit about that. Well, unfortunately, when a woman has a baby, there is usually some, sometimes not so much, but some and... occasionally a lot of damage in the vaginal area.

And it's not a great place to have to suture because it's kind of like suturing in a dark, unlit place. Right. And you have to do it by feel. You have to know the feel of the muscle and the tissues and be able to bring them together and sew in several layers and know which suture is going to hold. which one you need to use here and there and get it all back together, hopefully exactly the way it was before. And certainly the vaginal lining is not as tough as normal skin.

No, no, it's very tough. And what happens, unfortunately, when the muscles tear is they retract. And so you have to find them and bring them back together. So it's like trying to sew a snapped rubber band. You have to pull both sides together. And that's basically the consistency of it. And I'll tell you, it's true that some lacerations can go all the way through the anal sphincter, too. I wasn't going to mention that.

That's why I said quite deep instead of your descriptive layers. But the interesting thing is that that muscle is almost sort of circular. Yes. And if that's not to put together, if it's torn apart with a delivery and not put together, it is actually going to prevent the control. of bowel movements. Yes. And so... Well, you are being rather graphic today. I am. I am. That's sort of a surgical thing. Should have a warning for this. Yes. I mentioned this because there are all sorts of different skin, all sorts of different organs, all sorts of different mucosal membranes that may need to be

sutured. I mean, dentists sometimes have to suture tears in the cheek or in the gum areas. is sometimes bleeding after removal of a tooth will require stitching the gum together. So there are quite a few things that stitches are used for, and it's important to know that there are different types. Now, about 100 years ago, what we were using to suture with was mostly things like gut. And when I say gut, I'm talking about,

some people call it cat gut, but it was never really made from cat's guts. It was made from the intestinal lining of sheep and cows. So how did it end up being called cat? Do you have any idea? I have no idea. I have no idea.

Why wouldn't it have been a cow gun? Cow good. Yeah, they should have called a cowgut. It's not like cow is a longer word than cat. Right. It's true. It's unusual, but some of the cool things about history is that you just don't know why certain things.

There is an answer out there somewhere. If you guys know the answer to that, feel free. to send us an email at DR Bones Podcasts at AOL.com. Of course, I'm going to look at it up right this second also. Now, 100 years ago, we didn't have a suture and a thread as a one-unit kind of item. You had your suture needle and you had your string. Oh, wait, do you have the result of that cat gut inquiry? Yes, Google.

Why is cat gut called catgut? Although the name implies the usage of guts of cats, like you said, there is no record. of feline guts being used for this purpose. Again, like you said, the genius, Dr. Alton. The word cat, the word cat gut is derived from the term kit gut or kit string. The string used on a fiddle, which is also called a kit. Oh, a fiddle. Misinterpretation of the word kit as referring to a young cat led to the use of the term cat gut.

Oh, my gosh. Well, how about that? Just a confusion, which is how a lot of things come into play. So they should have called a kitten gut. No, no, no, no. They should have called it cow gut. That's right, exactly what it was. Well, anyhow, suture string and a needle.

These were two separate items about 100 years ago, and you threaded the needle, and what would happen is you would, as it goes through the skin, you have two different threads that are going through the skin at the same time. This causes an increased chance. of infection and they wanted to decrease the chance of infection with suturing and so what they did is they hollowed out the knee the end of the not the pointy end the other end of the suture needle right they stuck the string it in then they crimped the end and voila you have a one unit string and needle combination that is called swaging and since swaging occurred well since the 30s I guess that's pretty

much how you're doing it. Now the classification of sutures themselves by type of material and size of the thread that occurred around the same time as well. Souture diameters are most commonly used in humans are measured in zeros, much like buckshot. Just like you might know that double-ought buckshot is bigger than trippelot buckshot, 2-0 suture, it's not called double-op, but it's called 2-0 suture, is thicker. than 3-0 suture. The more zeros, the finer the thread. If you have a lot of zeros behind your thread,

then you probably can suture two bacteria together. Right. Good luck with that, though. There you go. Finer sutures have less tissue reaction. They heal faster, but they're more difficult to handle in people without a lot of experience, and that's why when we teach classes,

we use relatively thick material. 2-0 or 3-0, that's relatively thick material. We probably would use something. lesser depending, but it depends entirely on the type of tissue that we're talking about. In addition to size, sutures are classified as absorbable or not absorbable. An absorbable suture is one that's going to break down spontaneously over time, but not before the tissue has healed. Absorbable sutures are good in that they have the advantage of not requiring removal after healing is taken place. Dissolvable sutures are treated by the body as foreign objects.

And so the immune system of the body generates an inflammatory response that removes this perceived invasion, and that causes the sutures to absorb or eventually go away. And absorbable sutures take advantage of the body's tendency to eliminate foreign materials. Now, because dissolvable sutures may create more scarring than non-dissolvable sutures because of the reaction, the reaction of the body and inflammation, they're most often used internally rather than externally, although I've seen people use. them externally as well. And that's because they get absorbed. Now since these sutures are made from multiple fibers, they remain extremely strong in the first few days of healing. But the good news is that things like gut, either plain or chromic, I'll talk about that in the second, are gone in two to four weeks and some of the synthetic absorbables take several months to go away completely, but they are also something that will indeed go away completely. The difference between,

Plain cat gut and chromic cat gut is that they dip the gut into a chromic solution, and this causes it to be a little more long-lasting than just plain gut. So quickly, just a few types of absorbable sutures. Gut we mentioned, it's used for repairing internal soft tissue wounds or lacerations. Gut shouldn't be used for cardiovascular or neurological procedures, but you will not be doing those in your role as medic. You will be doing much simpler stuff. The body has the strongest reaction to this suture, by the way,

and this suture will often scar over. So not use much on skin, used, let's say after the delivery of a baby, used in dental procedures, things like that. But in general, this is an old suture probably has been supplanted by a lot of other more modern synthetic absorbable sutures. One of them is PDS. I mentioned that a second ago. And this is a synthetic sort of monothilament line type of suture and can be used for many types of soft tissue wound repair,

such as an abdominal closure. Another is called monochryl, M-O-C-R-Y-L, and that's also popular. V-I-C-R-Y-L and Dexon-D-E-X-O-N. All these are very, very popular synthetic absorables that have been around for a long time. many of these sutures now have sort of new versions of them, some of which absorb more rapidly. Some of them absorb less rapidly or stronger or weaker depending on what the needs are. And you don't really need to go through all those that they're going to be difficult to get. Anyhow, you can find some very basic ones like Vicarol.

You can find PDS. You can find Chromix, of course, and you can find silk. Now, let's talk a little bit about. the non-absorable sutures. The absorbable sutures, we talked a little bit about how long they last. Now, the time to about a 50% breaking strength for these sutures can last between just five days for the latest rapid sutures that are absorbable all the way to three to four weeks to the classic chromic gut.

Now, they're 50% breaking strength, but believe it or not, even though these things are absorbable, they will last much longer. For example, crumbic gut will last in the body. You'll find evidence of it in the body for about 90 days. Monocoril 90 to 120, vicarole 56 to 70. So these things will be there for a while, but they will eventually go away. But there are many sutures that will not go away. And in reality, the survival medic is probably going to be using those more often. Non-absorable sutures are best used in skin closure situations that require a prolonged tensile strength to them. They include the fishing line like monofilaments like nylon and proline, abraded multifilaments like surgical silk.

And there are a number of other different ones. Ethobond is one. Mersaline is something that we used in obstetrics to close the dilating cervix and women who are very premature, too premature for their fetus to survive. but who were not in labor. Some women have what we call incompetent cervixes. The cervix cannot stay closed long enough, and they lose multiple pregnancies when they hit about five, six months. And the merciline, you put it in a horseshoe fashion around the cervix, tie a shut, and it actually gave a lot of these women the opportunity to have more time

and get their baby to the point where it can survive. Well, so that's great, but basically what we're talking about is things that you would use as a survival medic. For the most part, you're going to use monofilaments like nylon, very useful because they have a very small likelihood of harboring any bacteria. Some braided multifilments like silk do have little nooks and crannies for these organisms to hide, and they're a couple of percent higher infection rate with them, but a lot of people feel that it's easier to tie knots with them. the monofilament lines like nylon seem to glide more easily through tissue. So what do I use when I teach people? When I teach you, I usually use braided silk because I'm not worried about, it's a pig's foot.

And so I'm not worried about infection, but I am worried about the ability of people to gain confidence in tying knots. And so I use braided silk more often than nylon. But the truth is, is that some people prefer nylon and some people teach with nylon. only so go figure I say that you should use probably two oh and three oh if you're going to be accumulating some supplies accumulate two oh three oh these are really thick sutures too thick for many surgeons but they're useful for the off-grid medic who does not tie surgical knots on a regular basis does not do suturing on a regular basis and I hope even in a survival situation you would not have to but they're easier to learn with there you don't have

to have a microscopic lens to be able to see these things. So those are some of the choices that are available with non-absorables. These are the kind that you'll want to have in place. They'll be in place forever. Now, is there a danger to leaving them in place? Well, the body does have a foreign body reaction. What that means is that it's going to wall off each of these sutures. And so you'll probably feel under the skin.

if you feel under the skin, if you had used some non-absorvable suture in a deep layer, let's say muscle, things like, you might feel sort of like a little string of beads. Those are granulomas, which are basically the walled-off remains of the suture and the body's reaction to it. Now, does it do anything bad to you for the most part? It doesn't. Matter of fact, even years later, some of these sutures may actually work their way out through the skin. but you might consider using something that's going to be completely absorbable, and there are a lot of materials that are just like that.

In reality, the size and the type of suture you're going to use, it's going to depend on the area of the body being repaired. And so slowly healing tissue such as skin and tendons, they require sutures that are going to last a longer time. On the skin, you probably would want non-absorable sutures, and you probably would want to remove them with suture scissors, probably, I would say, 7 to 10 days on most skin over joints, I would say 14 days or so, depending on how the healing process is going.

Maybe a shorter period of time if the laceration is being closed is on the face. I think that makes the longer they're in, the more likely that there'll be some scarring. Of course, in survival settings, cosmetic results are less important, but you're going to want to use, in most circumstances, the smallest suture that's going to be able to do the job and to last long enough to give the area as much healing as possible. So the type of needle, that's an important thing as well. It's not just a suture. It's not just a string, but it's the type of needle. Some needles are round.

If you cut them on cross-section, these are called tapered. or at traumatic needles, and they're best used for sensitive structures, like the lining of the bowel, other deep structures, maybe vaginal laceration or a cheek laceration, things like that. The skin, which is much tougher, would need a needle that is usually triangular-shaped. If you cut it on cross-section, these are called cutting needles, and these are best used on tuft materials, especially skin, is what it's most commonly used for.

They use the sharp edges of the triangle, I guess the points of the triangle, if you see this thing cut on the cross-section, it's a triangle, and this allows the needle to go more easily through tough tissue-like skin. Now, in the end, the choice of suture needles and materials just going to vary depending on the user. Each surgeon is going to have his own preferences

or her own preferences, and it's based on their experience. Remember the act of suturing or stapling a wound. By the way, stapling is something that we're going to talk about in future shows. It's more traumatic than using things like butterfly closures or stereostropes or surgical glues due to the fact that you're making more punctures in an area of skin that's already injured, right?

You're putting holes in as you're passing the needle through extra holes, and each extra hole that you create could allow the entry of bacteria into the wound. So you have to do your very very, very best to just use the amount of sutures that you actually need remember you're going to have a limited amount of this stuff if you're the person doing the suturing then obviously there's not a modern medical system around and they're probably not manufacturing new sutures and so therefore what you got is what's got to last and so you have to do everything you can to only

use them when absolutely necessary i'm going to be doing a video on this in the near future and i hope you'll Hope you'll take a look at it. It's going to be on DR Bones, Nurse Amy's YouTube channel. Well, that's all I've got for today. I want to thank everybody for listening to the Survival Medicine Podcast. We'll be back next time. You've been listening to the Doom and Bloom Hour with medical preparedness experts, Dr. Bones, and Nurse Amy. Check out our website at www.combeam.com for hundreds of informative articles about survival medicine, gardening, natural remedies, medical supplies, and lots of other good stuff.

Contact us, send your email to Dr. Bones Podcast at AOL.com or use a contact form on the main page of the website. See you next week.