• Question: is it possible to knock someone out by holding one of their presure points?

    Asked by supahhotfire to Amy, Karen, Sarah, Vijay, Will on 14 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Sarah Martin

      Sarah Martin answered on 14 Jun 2012:

      Yes it is! There are pressure points in the neck where our blood pressure is measured. If you press them, they report high blood pressure, so the body lowers blood pressure to adjust. When you let go, blood pressure shoots down and you pass out!

    • Photo: Amy Birch

      Amy Birch answered on 15 Jun 2012:

      Hi supahhotfire, nice question 🙂

      Absolutely!
      The easiest way to do this is to press hard on the carotid arteries in your neck. They contain receptors that measure pressure and so if you press on them, your body thinks that your blood pressure is too high and sends signals to increase the size of your blood vessels which will decrease your blood pressure dramatically.
      As well as this, signals get sent via the vagus nerve (which is next to the carotid arteries) to your heart and this makes your heart rate slow down.
      This all causes too little blood (and therefore oxygen) to get to the brain, and because the brain needs a constant supply of oxygen this causes it to shut off and you fall unconscious.

      But don’t try this! It can be very dangerous because if the brain is deprived of oxygen for even a very small amount of time (less than 5 minutes), it can cause serious brain damage.

    • Photo: Karen Reed

      Karen Reed answered on 16 Jun 2012:

      Hiya supahhotfire – I’ve just looked up some stuff on pressure points because although I agree with everything Sarah and Amy have said I wondered if there were any others that could do the same. I’ve just learnt that several of the martial arts teach about the pressure points or “sensitive” points that cause the maximum pain when hit with the view of knocking the opponentent out due to the intensity of the pain caused.

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