Medical Science Of Star Wars

The Medical science of star wars is indeed quite remarkable. Someone is always losing a limb or two, but no worries! We can fix that right up. Let’s talk about the Bacta tank at Echo-base. This large tank where we see Luke fully submerged is designed for rapid healing. But how does it work? Well friends that is the topic of discussion in this debate. This might get a bit lengthy but stick with me.


A little about myself before i go on. By trade i am a Navy Corpsman. You can consider me the equivalent of an Army medic (68W). I am trained to heal combat casualties both on ships, hospitals, and when required, with the Marines. Most of my experience comes from working in a hospital. I am no doctor by any means although the title Doc has been passed around and is a term used for only respected Corpsman. That being said I am very much interested in the how healing battlefield wounds in the Star Wars universe work.


Let’s first start off with the healing tank and what wookieepedia has to say. Bacta tanks are a specialized piece of medical equipment designed for rapid healing using bacta liquid. This healing liquid was very hard to come by and only a few military bases had it available for use. That is basically it… they didn't really have a lot to say about how it works. So how about some speculation. In a live victim of hypothermia (prolonged exposure to cold), like Luke had on Hoth, would be to warm the body up slowly so as to avoid further nerve damage and possible burns. In the bacta tank I assume this is what's happening. A healing enzyme of some sort would naturally debride (remove dead or unhealthy tissue) and help the surrounding tissue to fill in the wounds with your own natural healthy skin cells. In a real world setting we might use wet dressing (gauze infused with antibiotic ointment), or dry, but never to fully submerge. Allowing a wound to air dry naturally might be best for healing depending on the severity.


Some species in the SW universe have adverse effects in this process due to metabolism and may require extended treatment. In a trauma victim such as blaster wounds may also be healed in this way but in a real life setting you wouldn't want to submerge a patient with a chest penetration in a giant tank of water because then you risk the chance of fluid flowing into the lungs. We don't know if the Medical Droids have this same issue. I haven't seen any penetrating injuries in SW anyways so maybe it’s a moot point. It seems that blood really isn't much of a concern. The real fear is being burnt to a crisp! Healing burns in real life however is about proper wound dressing. Again, depending on the severity of the burn a doctor may prescribe ointment or to keep the burn clean and dry.



The latest breakthrough in real world science for rapidly healing burn victims is the Skin Cell gun. A sample of the patients own stem cells is taken, placed in an aerosol can, and then sprayed directly onto the patient. This method would allow skin to heal in days not months. Besides the reduced chance of infection, the Skin Cell gun also helps reduce scaring. Unfortunately it only works on 2nd degree burns. Skin graphing is always a viable option but can be complicated, especially when 90% of the patient has 3rd degree burns. This is the closest that we have to a bacta tank so far.



Severed limbs are flying all over the place in Star Wars! It’s a common theme throughout the series, but as i said before you need not worry. There seems to be no need in SW to stop bleeding as light sabers cleanly cut and cauterize instantly. That’s some serious heat. Technology to heal these types of injuries seems to be widespread among the medical droids because Luke gets a new hand almost immediately after losing his fleshy one. This is definitely not impossible by today's medicine as combat victims are routinely fitted with prosthetic limbs. The disconnect between reality and fantasy is how functional the new limbs are. We can see that Luke can feel pain in his new hand when the droid tests his sensitivity with a mild shock. We can also see that he has full use of his original dexterity. Real prosthetic limbs are not this advanced yet. but technology is improving.


In SW Anakin is given a complete set of armor that is designed to keep him alive after his horrible accident. We can safely assume that this armor that keeps him alive also monitors his vital signs and adjust to the stress of fighting. A more primitive version of Anakin’s armor can be seen worn by General Grievous, proving that Star Wars medical science is capable of making technological advances. We can also see that he doesn't have the range of motion or speed that he once did. Luke on the other hand (no pun intended) seems to have full use of his body.



In both father and son I believe that these new limbs also provided superhuman strength. In a real scenario though science is hard at work attempting to connect nerves to prosthetic and make them more capable of everyday use such as the simple task of picking up a glass of water and drinking from it. I don’t think we are very far off from this Sci-Fi reality. It may take a few more years but it’s not impossible.


If you have any theories of how these things work please share. I’d like to thank @TIDMADT for inspiring me to write this one out. We were discussing blasters and how they work. I can't find any penetration wounds in SW. It seems they are bolts of energy, still capable of severe damage to stationary objects and flesh. In my opinion the clips we see on screen could be charging cells of some sort and not projectiles.

@Trevor what do you think?

 

my mistake

 

Wow thanks man!

 

most defiantly but not if they can’t hit anything! lol