Totally random question - magic powder - what is it ?

[NIrishGuy]

So, whilst sitting around the dinner table in our canteen at lunch time today several of us got talking about a product we all remember fondly and this was a small bottle of white powder seeming known to us all as "magic powder" that our mothers used on use on us all should we have had a small cut or graze in order to stop it bleeding, it was miraculous stuff and worked every time and almost instantly it seemed.

 

Of course now that we're all older we realise that the name "magic powder" was something obviously our mothers were telling us for effect and as one of the new mothers in the office wanted to go out and buy a bottle of this "magic powder" for her own son and none of us have seen a bottle in years, I was just wondering might anyone know the proper name for said powder perhaps?

 

I'm also guessing that it's the same stuff that is given to soldiers in their field dressing kits to enable them to sprinkle it on gunshot wounds to both limit any risk of infection and also assist in coagulating blood flow, so, any ideas guys or maybe it was in fact just "magic powder" after all :-)    

[Guest anonone]

I don't remember "magic powder"...maybe it was a European / UK thing?

 

But the stuff given to soldiers was generically called sulfa:

 

Sulfa had a central role in preventing wound infections during the war. American soldiers were issued a first-aid kit containing sulfa pills and powder, and were told to sprinkle it on any open wound.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfonamide_%28medicine%29

[NIrishGuy]

wonderful - there's a start, I'll check it out, many thanks :-)

[KhorTose]

I don't remember "magic powder"...maybe it was a European / UK thing?

 

But the stuff given to soldiers was generically called sulfa:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfonamide_(medicine)

You are correct for WWII, but now there is a new magic powder that does cause clotting by drying up the water in the blood and leaving the clotting agent. It has been tested at the VA I worked at, and if used correctly appears to work. However, there are reports from Iraq that appear to discredit these results. I will find you a url....

 

http://www.omg-facts.com/Science/There-Is-A-Medical-Powder-That-Will-Clot/47759

 

Manufactured by several companies now under different names.

[ceejay]

I guess the stuff that was available 30 years ago, when NIrish was young, would have been powdered potash alum, the same material used in styptic pencill. If I remember right, the aluminium in it causes fibrinogen, the protein in blood that makes up the structure of blood clots, to coagulate.

[NIrishGuy]

I'm guessing you're right there ceejay, both on the 30 years part AND the styptic pencil ! :-)