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MED DEFENSE

Setting a New Standard for the Stabilization of Pelvic Fractures
The SAM Sling® is the first and only force-controlled circumferential pelvic belt designed to provide safe and effective reduction and stabilization of open-book pelvic fractures. If you’re a trauma surgeon accustomed to dealing with motorcycle accidents, heavy-equipment injuries, falls from height, or severe car accidents, that says it all. For years, there’s been no scientifically proven device for stabilizing pelvic fractures in the field, during the first “golden hour” after the accident, when lives are most easily saved. Now there is.

Saving Lives at 33 Pounds of Tension
Pelvic ring fractures are devastating injuries, accompanied by extensive internal bleeding that can often be fatal. Since the mid-Nineteenth Century, standard first-aid protocol has been to wrap a bedsheet or belt around the victim’s hips, cinch it tight, and hope for the best. It’s a technique that works, even for the worst type of pelvic fractures, known as open-book fractures because the pelvic ring has sprung open, like the pages of a book. Compression “closes the book,” reduces pain, slows bleeding, and promotes clot formation as the patient is transported to an emergency department.

The problem with bed sheets and belts is that they’re an extremely inexact methodology. Not only is there no control over how tightly the sheet is cinched, but until development began on the SAM Sling®, nobody even knew how tightly it should be cinched or exactly where on the body it should be placed. Imagine how it would be if the only way to measure blood pressure was with un-calibrated instruments, each of which was different! With pelvic ring fractures, too much compression force shifts the broken ends of bones and causes additional damage—too little allows bleeding to continue.

In 2002, researchers at a leading hospital determined that the optimum safe pressure for closing unstable open-book fractures falls in a range centered on approximately 150 Newtons, or 33 pounds. That allowed the creation of the SAM Sling™'s patented “autostop” buckle, which has spring-loaded prongs that lock the buckle in place when the right amount of force is applied. Not only is there no guesswork needed, the autostop buckle simply won’t allow the belt to be over-tightened.

Tested in Peer-reviewed Medical Studies
The SAM Sling® was developed through rigorous laboratory and clinical studies. Reports at numerous scientific conferences and in peer-reviewed medical journals have documented that it effectively reduces and stabilizes unstable pelvic fractures.

Features and Benefits
The SAM Sling® is built for quick, easy use under less-than-perfect conditions. As with our other products, we sweat the details so you don’t have to sweat them in the field.

• Each patented autostop buckle is individually tested to ensure that it engages at the correct force.
• A low-friction plastic covering on the back side of the sling allows it to slide easily beneath the victim, with or without a backboard.
• Soft interior fabric prevents unnecessary discomfort.
• Velcro™-friendly exterior allows quick and easy fastening once the autostop buckle engages.
• Easily applied by a single emergency responder.
• Vapor-permeable belt prevents skin irritation and odor.
• Pressure on skin does not exceed 32 mm of mercury, protecting skin from pressure damage.
• Except for two small metal springs in the buckle, the SAM Sling™ is transparent to X-rays.
• The sling is contoured to be narrower in the front than in the back, allowing urinary catheterization and accesses to the abdomen and the femoral vessels.
• Unaffected by altitude or temperature.
• Available in three sizes: small, medium, and large.
• Training videos, CDs, and online training guides show the SAM Sling’s proper use under a variety of conditions.

Pelvic Fracture Statistics
• Of 120,000 pelvic fractures reported in the U.S. in a typical year, 21,000 were pelvic ring fractures.
• The mortality rate of pelvic ring fractures is reported to be more than 25 percent.
• The combination of a pelvic ring fracture with other injuries doubles or triples the mortality rate.
• The average pelvic ring fracture victim loses two to three units of blood for each additional pelvic fracture.
• By reducing and stabilizing pelvic fractures, pelvic belts or binders significantly reduce blood loss.
• Victims are often confused or unconscious, making it difficult to diagnose pelvic ring fractures without X-rays or CT scans. Physical examination is inaccurate approximately 90 percent of the time.
• Trauma surgeons, orthopedic surgeons, and ER physicians worldwide recognize the benefits of circumferential pelvic compression, as is evidenced by the many jerry-rigged devices that have been used to bind pelvic injuries.

Important Warnings
• Based on in vitro testing, the SAM Sling® will not present a hazard or risk to a patient undergoing an MRI procedure using an MR system operating at 3-Tesla or less. The SAM Sling® contains ferromagnetic springs in the buckle. Therefore, it is important to ensure that the SAM Sling® is firmly applied to the patient prior to entry into the MRI environment (as stated in the labeling for this device). Accordingly, there will be no hazard or risk to a patient undergoing an MRI procedure. The SAM Sling® should not be removed from the patient while in the MR system room.
• This product is not recommended for use on children.

General Characteristics
• Force-controlled circumferential pelvic sling belt
• Three sizes based on hip circumference: Small (28-45 inches; 71-114 cm), Medium (33-50 inches; 84-127 cm), and Large (36-60 inches, 91-387 cm)
• Patented “autostop” buckle effectively stabilizes and reduces open-book pelvic fractures in the field.

For price information please visit our "order online" section, contact your official SAM® Medical Products distributor or contact us at 800.818.4726.

  







1) Unfold Sling with white surface facing up.		  

2) Place white side of Sling beneath patient at level of buttocks (greater trochanters / symphysis pubis).		  

3) Firmly close Sling by placing black Velcro© side of flap down on blue surface of Sling. Fold back material as needed. Try to place buckle close to midline.




4) Grab orange handle on outer surface of flap and release from flap by pulling upward.		  



5) With or without assistance pull both orange handles in opposite directions to tighten Sling.		  



6) Keep pulling until you hear the buckle click and feel the free handle stop.




7) As soon as the free handle stops, maintain tension, and firmly press the orange handle against the blue surface of the Sling.		  



8) To remove Sling, lift orange handle next to flap and release Velcro© by pulling upward. Maintain tension and slowly allow Sling to loosen.		  



9) Do not cut to remove. Release orange pull handle in order to remove. To be removed only under the supervision of a physician.



These QuickTime video examples were taken from our SAM® Splint Training CD-ROM. When you click on the links below, the Quicktime movie will open in a new window. If you need the free QuickTime player you can download it by clicking the icon below.



SAM Sling® Training Video Windows Media [73MB] Quicktime [39MB]



People like to say that necessity is the mother of invention. But sometimes, you first have to spend some time thinking about what you’re missing.

So it was with the SAM Sling®. The impetus for its development arose in 1999 when surgeons at Portland, Oregon’s Legacy Emanuel Hospital conceived an idea to improve the treatment of open book pelvic ring fractures. In their view, the technology for treating pelvic fractures had not changed since civil war surgeons first realized the benefits of cinching bed sheets around the injured pelvis to reduce pain.

Bedsheets indeed are effective, but cumbersome. Even today, no one knows how tight these sheets are to be applied. For that matter, nobody really knows where to place the sheet for optimum closure of “open-book” pelvic fractures, in which the pelvic ring yawns open like the pages of a book, creating a large cavity into which the patient can lose dangerous amounts of blood.

Working with cadavars and a grant from the U.S. Office of Naval Research, Michael Bottlang, Ph.D., and James Kreig, M.D., discovered that optimum location for applying pelvic compression was near the point of the hips (specifically, at the level of the greater trochanters and the symphysis pubis). Application at that level closes open-book fractures most effectively, without putting dangerous stresses on other types of fractures. In a peer-reviewed study published in 2002 in The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery, Bottlang, Kreig, and three colleagues reported that the ideal tension on the pelvic sling was in the range between 140 Newtons and 180 Newtons of force. The Legacy Emmanuel researchers have published additional findings in other peer-reviewed journals, as well as presenting their discoveries at numerous scientific symposia.

With a proven breakthrough in the treatment of pelvic ring fractures, the inventors then looked for a company to help them bring it to the world. Knowing SAM® Medical Products’ reputation for gold-standard emergency-service products, they approached Dr. Sam Scheinberg, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Results of a clinical trial with a prototype sling were presented at the 2003 Orthopedic Association Meeting and have been submitted for publication.

With the help of the SAM Sling®, the time has finally come to close the book on pelvic ring fractures.

Product Numbers
556652SM: SAM Sling® Small - Orange/Blue
556652: SAM Sling® Medium - Orange/Blue
556652LG: SAM Sling® Large - Orange/Blue