🩹 When Simple Tools Save Lives

The Clever Use of Plastic Packaging Wrap in Field Medicine

Once in a while, someone comes up with an idea so clever that you wonder why it hasn’t been standard practice all along.

My colleague Pat Thompson from South Africa mentioned this concept to me some time ago, and I immediately thought: this is the kind of practical thinking we need more of in austere medicine.

Now, Pat and his co-authors have published their work in the Journal of Special Operations Medicine, describing a tool that is almost absurdly simple — yet remarkably effective.

They demonstrate how ordinary plastic packaging wrap, the same type used to secure goods on pallets, can be repurposed for a wide range of medical uses when traditional equipment is unavailable.

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🔍 The Study in Short

In their paper, Plastic Packaging Wrap for Patient Packaging, Thompson, Hudson, and Irvine-Smith describe how linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE) — the common “cling” or “pallet wrap” — can serve as an improvised alternative to expensive or bulky field bandages.