Explain how a carotid choke works.

[tao.jonez]

Did you read the question you quoted Snake? It says from a choke...

I don't think it's absolutely determined that the reason for the KO is lack of oxygen to the brain.

[tao.jonez]

knockout from a grappling submission or knockout from strikes?

Um...re-read that.

Choke, not strikes.

[W. Rabbit]

Did you read the question you quoted Snake? It says from a choke...

I don't think it's absolutely determined that the reason for the KO is lack of oxygen to the brain.

Ultimately the unconsciousness is the result of an oxygen-starved brain. That's what all the medical citations in the thread say.

[DayOfTheJackass]

Though pressure on the nerve can make people black out, when people are choked out surely what is happening is the lack of O2, shut down non-vital functions thing. The brain may also sense that this is about to happen due to the sudden pressure change discussed in the thread (thus explaining your occasional ‘instant chokes’). In support of this: tts a lot easier to get choked out if you've been drilling chokes and hadn’t taken a few deep breaths in between! Pressure to the neck doesn’t explain that.

[tao.jonez]

Ultimately the unconsciousness is the result of an oxygen-starved brain. That's what all the medical citations in the thread say.

I was thinking that a possible reason for unconsciousness is the brain's anticipation of lack of oxygen, not necessarily due to the lack of oxygen itself. Maybe I misunderstand this though.

[Coach Josh]

The medical citations talk about syndromes and disorders that happen not the specific act of being choked out.

The only one that comes close is the Kodokan one that said it measured the O2 level via the ear.

Even that one was more than likely done with the uke at rest.

Now here is an interesting tangent. How about because of the ease of restriction to the veins. The blood does not leave the brain fast enough causing CO2 to remain and the oxygenated blood to not be used by the cells. So while good blood is still present it is not being used.

While we have talked about the fuel we have never thought of the waste.

[W. Rabbit]

The medical citations talk about syndromes and disorders that happen not the specific act of being choked out.

The CDC did a study on the "Choking/Feinting" Game in 2008:

Unintentional Strangulation Deaths from the "Choking Game" Among Youths Aged 6--19 Years --- United States, 1995--2007

I thought I had cited it earlier but I must have forgotten. I think you'll like this report, lots of useful sources.

1. Andrew TA, Fallon KK. Asphyxial games in children and adolescents. Am J Forensic Med Pathol 2007;28:303--7.
2. Urkin J, Merrick J. The choking game or suffocation roulette in adolescence. Int J Adolesc Med Health 2006;18:207--8.
3. Williams County Partnerships for Success. Williams County Youth Health Risk Behavioral Survey, fall 2006. Bryan, OH: Williams County Partnerships for Success; 2007. Available at http://www.co.williams.oh.us/family%...t%202-6-07.pdf.
4. Slovic P. Risk-taking in children: age and sex differences. Child Dev 1966;37:169--76.
5. Le D, Macnab AJ. Self strangulation by hanging from cloth towel dispensers in Canadian schools. Inj Prev 2001;7:231--3.
6. Gicquel JJ, Bouhamida K, Dighiero P. Ophthalmological complications of the asphyxiophilic "scarf game" in a 12-year-old child [French]. J Fr Ophtalmol 2004;27:1153--5.
7. Shlamovitz GZ, Assia A, Ben-Sira L, Rachmel A. "Suffocation roulette": a case of recurrent syncope in an adolescent boy. Ann Emerg Med 2003;41:223--6.
8. Lunetta P, Tiirikainen K, Smith GS, Penttila A, Sajantila A. How well does a national newspaper reporting system profile drowning? Int J Inj Contr Saf Promot 2006;13:35--41.
9. Rainey DY, Runyan CW. Newspapers: a source for injury surveillance? Am J Public Health 1992;82:745--6.
10. Sorenson SB, Manz JG, Berk RA. News media coverage and the epidemiology of homicide. Am J Public Health 1998;88:1510--4.

[W. Rabbit]

While we have talked about the fuel we have never thought of the waste.

The bloodstream is responsible for removing wastes from the brain, right?

So significant drop in BP from the sinu-vagal-carotid choke means the brain becomes stagnant very quickly, like a CPU without proper cooling everything will sloooooow and eventually freeze in it's tracks.

Well not really freeze, your mind probably falls into something similar to an advanced stage of sleep for a few seconds. AS long as constriction stops before brain cells begin to die, the body's system SHOULD normalize itself (the proper nervous response) as pumping increases from it's vagus-induced level to normal, standing heart rate.

When it doesn't (as in the case of Choking Game fatalities), cardiac arrest is induced and death occurs within minutes.

Another (maybe erroneous on my part) observation from all this data is that your ALIVE JUDO heart rate is much higher, thus the vagus response causes a bigger BP drop than it would if you were relaxed, and your body NEEDS to consume way more oxygen than normal because of changes in metabolic rate.

Is it..easier to get choked out when you resist incorrectly? And by that I don't mean letting yourself get choked, I mean wasting energy.

Is remaining calm and minimizing energy/force needs (the keys to Judo?) the key to avoiding chokeout by carotid constriction?

Hmmm..you guys tell me. This would imply that when you train getting choked in judo it not only strengthens the physical aspects but also the mental aspects of being in a strangulation situation and optimizing your body's resource use while your brain attempts to instruct your body how to counter the situation.

I know jnp's story was anecdotal but if he's able after years of choke training to last 200% the normal time it takes to cause a healthy teen to experience strangulation syncope...

[Coach Josh]

CDC article has no useful information. We are all aware of the fact that if you put something around your neck and tighten it you more than likely will die, unless your Clint Eastwood.

Conditioning as in the case of JNP is irrelevant also because it doesn't address the norm but an extreme. I can hold off a choke longer than most people due to situational awareness and technical knowledge also many humans can do many out of the norm things due to conditioning and training.

Additionally I feel no lowering of BP when a cartiod choke is applied correctly. It is much different than when my mouth is covered and breathing is restricted by say material of the gi when I am in a triangle choke.

I have been people's blood vessels rupture on their face when they get choked out correctly. How can this happen from a lower BP?

[W. Rabbit]

Additionally I feel no lowering of BP when a cartiod choke is applied correctly. It is much different than when my mouth is covered and breathing is restricted by say material of the gi when I am in a triangle choke.

I have been people's blood vessels rupture on their face when they get choked out correctly. How can this happen from a lower BP?

Yes, your BP will go up initially during constriction (explaining burst vessels) only until the vagus nerve tells the heart to slow pumping, at which time it will go down. This is a built-in biofeedback protection system to prevent your circulatory system from rupturing.

According to sources that's the primary purpose of the vagus, to detect circulatory overpressure and compensate by instructing the heart to slow down, but the response is FAST (a few seconds). The Judo carotid choke is (amongst other things) artificially inducing that response.

The lowering of BP occurs after the vagus response kicks in, which means you are unconscious or very nearly there (ie you are not going to feel your BP lower). You would never feel it, because by the time you're conscious again your BP would have stabilized at its proper level.

If we were to chart your blood pressure vs. time during a Judo carotid choke in an X-Y axis, you would likely see an increase where it initially goes up (constriction) and then drops suddenly (vagus response), followed by a gradual increase back to your standing BP (stabilization).

I googled for a good graph, not sure how closely this one fits the discussions. I think this one might work:



The point of the CDC articles was to show unconsciousness by strangulation (of any kind..Judo is not special) has been studied quite a bit..there is nothing inherently special about the judo carotid choke other than it's optimized for causing syncope quickly.

Thus the better (stronger, closer to the right nerves/arteries) you apply the choke, the faster syncope can be induced, the worse you apply the choke or the more conditioned uke is, the harder it will be to do this effectively.

And yes, if you were to continue to apply the carotid choke on someone, they would die.

According to both the CDC studies and others online, passing out from ANY form of strangulation (including Judo) is bad for your circulatory system....it is a low level form of shock. If you have heart issues, I doubt receiving carotid Judo chokes are a good idea for that reason.