What is a medical leech?

Medical leeches are raised in captivity and help patients heal wounds. Discover how leeches and other parasites are used for medical purposes in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com.

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Brainstuff from dot com where smart happens. There's
a new show on Discovery Channel called Monsters Inside Me,
and it fits perfectly with today's question. What is a
medical leech? You may have never seen a leech before.
They come in a variety of shapes and sizes, but

(00:21):
medical leeches look a lot like a long slug about
the size of your finger. They have a mouth at
the second end that attaches quite firmly, and the leech
will about double in size as it feeds. This sounds
rather unpleasant, but leeches turn out to be useful in medicine.
If you've ever had microsurgery on an extremity like a

(00:43):
finger or an ear lobe, one post surgery problem you
get involves blood flow. By attaching a leech, a patient
gets several benefits. For one, the leech pulls blood through
the extremity as it feeds. For another, it injects a
helpful anticoagulant that improves blood flow. And because of the

(01:04):
whole and that anticoagulant the leech leaves behind, there will
be bleeding after the leech falls off, and it's also
helpful to healing. Medical leeches are raised in captivity, so
they're sterile to a certain degree. If you want to
buy one, you can go find them on the internet
for about seven bucks each. Leeches are not the only
medically useful parasite. You can also buy medical maggots. These

(01:28):
little worm like creatures are put into bad wounds to
clean them out. The maggots will eat dead flesh, but
leave living flesh alone. After a day or two, the
wound is cleared of all the dead flesh and healing
usually proceeds much more quickly. If you enjoy parasites like leeches,
be sure to check out Monsters Inside Me on the

(01:49):
Discovery Channel Wednesdays at nine pm. Do you have any
ideas or suggestions for this podcast? If so, please send
me an email at podcast at how stuff works dot com.
For more on this and thousands of other topics, go
to how stuff works dot com and be sure to
check out the brain stuff blog on the how stuffworks
dot com home page.