According to powerlifters and the like, you get about 15 seconds of an adrenaline boost.
I had a chance to try it once, in a competition but - having never done it - I realized that I had no idea what my reaction would be. I could end up being there, in front of a hundred people, with burning red eyes going through sneezing fits, snot flying everywhere, etc. and overall causing a big scene in the middle of the event, just to try and get that extra 10 pounds - which I still might not do.
If I ever do try it, I suppose that I’ll have to update the thread.
There are many possible reasons to briefly rouse someone who is unconscious. It helps with diagnosis, ruling out some nasties. It helps you decide whether they need help breathing, or will in the near future. It can provide assurance to anesthetists and families.
I am convinced snelling salts can be a noxious stimulus that does this. I am less convinced it is better or easier than many other stimuli (injecting water into an ear, flicking fingers, etc.). It is not clear to me about boosting athletic performance - adrenaline is often already elevated in competition. But it is cheap to try; they don’t cost much.
Yes, and when this is necessary, you shake them by the shoulder and see if they wake up. If they don’t, the next step is the AVPU assessment, and the next step is vitals and EEG and further diagnostic. If they are really that far gone, you don’t wave noxious and possibly injurious Victorian-era smelling salts in their airway. It won’t help, and it may harm them in ways you don’t understand (because they’re too unconscious to tell you what’s wrong). Like maybe they have asthma or a respiratory illness, but they’re too unconscious to tell you that ammonia could trigger worse symptoms.
The only legitimate medical use for smelling salts (that I can conceive) is during a medical procedure where the patient is expected to faint due to trauma-related shock, but they need to be a conscious participant for whatever reason. Perhaps the patient needs to hold their body in a certain position, but some visible bleeding is expected, and they are known to faint at the sight of blood. Maybe in a very uniquely contrived situation like that.
I think reviving a woman who has just given birth and is visiting the toilet for the first time and faints, might possibly be an instance when smelling salts are indicated.
That mini burst of adrenaline is enough to push her blood pressure up enough so she can return to the world of the living.
I was hanging out in a friend’s tattoo shop years ago. A couple came in for matching small tribal calf pieces. The woman had hers done, everything went fine. Then the guy got his piece done, things didn’t go fine.
Every time the needle touched him he passed out. He said it was the heat, so we set up a fan blowing directly on him. Each time he fainted his gf would massage his shoulders and talk softly until he recovered.
The third or forth time he fainted, the artist slapped him across the face, hard. He came to and my friend told him, “I’m through fucking around with you. Pass out again and you can get the fuck outa my shop”.
He stayed awake for the rest (15 minutes) of the piece, too afraid to faint.
One summer I was helping the neighbors during planting, and the son, about my age (22 at the time) was knifing anhydrous. There was a leak in the hose, but did he fix it? No! He just found a length of hose and stuck it out the cab window as far from the leak as he could and breathed through it.
Not all farmers are the brightest. On the other hand, he’s still alive with all his fingers*, as far as I know.
* as a kid, I would meet some old farmers with missing fingers. It wasn’t as rare as you’d think.They tried unclogging a corn picker without turning it off. More than one farmer! Sheesh.
Smelling salts have nothing to do with adrenaline, they do not manipulate blood pressure, that’s just a gym-rat urban legend. People observed that it wakes people up and misinterpret that as some kind of Red Bull effect when it’s really just the pain of getting a hit of ammonia up the snout.
Relevant bullet points as to why their EMS is directed not to use inhalants at all:
In conclusion, smelling salts/ammonia inhalants are clearly bunk. It’s a strongly persistent folk legend with no legitimate medical use, and should be avoided.
I don’t understand the point of any of this. Guy faints while getting a tattoo. So what? Let him faint. He’s not operating the tattoo gun, he’s not driving a forklift.
In the movies, every unconscious person needs to be smacked back into alertness, but that’s not real life. In real life we elevate their feet and keep them comfortable until they can be evacuated.
Not as simple as you make it sound. You need to stay still while being inked. When the guy fainted his leg was no longer in position for the work being done and he was moving involuntarily. Plus his gf was freaking out.
I don’t remember the nature of the call but many years ago we used it on an unresponsive female. My partner got out the vial, held it away from her body & snapped it open with that hand (just the way one is supposed to)…then started jumping up & down while uttering a blue streak of four-letter words; seems she had a small cut on her finger that she didn’t realize/forgot about & some got in the wound causing much shock at the (temporary) & unexpected pain.
What does this mean? According to every response in this thread smelling salts do exactly what they are supposed to do, wake you up with a burst of energy. Maybe it has not legitimate medical use and should be avoided, but smelling salts are not a folk legend.
When something is suggested with no citation except “everyone is saying”, that’s pretty much the definition of a folk legend.
People see smelling salts used to “wake someone up” and intuit that it’s a stimulant, like a shot of Red Bull. But it isn’t. It’s an aversion response to a mildly toxic irritant.
I posted a cite above from a medical authority detailing why smelling salt treatment is no longer considered appropriate. However, nobody will be posting any cites from any medical authority saying it’s a stimulant or it’s a recommended treatment for anything, because it isn’t.
Your cites explain why it is no longer recommended, primarily because of potential negative reactions. That ammonia inhalers can wake an unconscious person is undisputed.
It is stimulating like taking a big bite of wasabi or onion or pure mustard is stimulating (feel free to try those to see what I mean, safer than sniffing ammonia). I doubt anyone supposes it is like injecting crystal meth.
I don’t dispute that it can wake someone who is unconscious. As I’ve said repeatedly, I dispute that it’s medically recommended or necessary, and I dispute the gym-rat folklore that it provides any meaningful autonomic stimulation or “boost” or “focus” like a shot of Red Bull.
Scan this thread for mentions of “adrenaline”. It’s a common myth among professional athletes, and people repeat it uncritically.
I have never heard of folklore that says smelling salts are medically necessary. Red Bull is full of caffeine and other junk you ingest, so any energy boost associated with it is not at all related to how smelling salts work. I agree the idea that an adrenaline rush that provides enhanced strength from the use is off base but I’m pretty sure anything that affects the body like smelling salts do will provide some additional adrenaline. And as I mentioned that will help an athlete get focused, which is why they use it.
So once again, smelling salts are not ‘bullshit’ or ‘bunk’. They do exactly what is described here and there is no folklore involved. They have had been used for medical purposes in the past and medicine is not simply limited to procedures that are ‘medically necessary’, a term of art used by and determined by doctors.
I’m pretty sure it doesn’t provide any additional adrenaline whatsoever, not unless you use enough ammonia to actually injure the person. Stimulus avoidance is a neurological reflex, not an autonomic response.
They use it because they think it helps them gets focused. The reason for this belief is because they saw it used by professional boxers, who actually do have a legitimate need to go in and out of light unconsciousness. From that observation they wrongly inferred that smelling salts boost performance.
The practices of athletes don’t demonstrate anything except the fact that they are voracious consumers of both science and pseudoscience. They will uncritically imitate anything they see or hear that is said to increase performance, with little thought to whether or why it actually works.
I did exactly that with wasabi when I mistook it for miso the the poor light of the noodle house I was eating in. The effect was indeed very similar to an ammonia capsule I’d had inflicted on me as a kid except it didn’t stop.
I induced a giggling fit in a young woman and a waitress when offered a cup of green tea ice cream and replied facetiously “No thanks, last time they got it mixed up with the wasabi”.