UKRAINE, KHARKIV, Dec 26— Doctors at a military hospital in Kharkiv performed surgery on 41-year-old serviceman Oleksandr, who survived 36 days with a tourniquet around his injured leg. The medical team said they had never encountered a case like this before.  They are now preparing him for transfer to the west regions of Ukraine for further rehabilitation, reported the Kharkiv military hospital.

For over a month, 41-year-old Oleksandr couldn’t be evacuated from his position near Vovchansk, a city near the Russian border in the northern area of Kharkiv Oblast. During this entire time, a tourniquet remained tightly wrapped around his right leg. Doctors noted that tourniquets are typically recommended to be applied for no longer than two hours.

“The man survived due to the proper management of the tourniquet. If it hadn’t been applied or had been applied incorrectly, he would have died. I believe that the [level of] training of military personnel is improving,” said Viacheslav Kurinnyi, deputy chief of medical service at the Military Medical Clinical Center of the Northern Region. Now, more soldiers know what to do when injured, Kurinnyi added.

The soldier is from Khmelnytskyi (a city in the west of Ukraine), but was fighting near Kharkiv. He was brought to the hospital conscious but with serious injuries and survived through surgery as well. “Unfortunately, the part of his limb with the tourniquet had to be amputated. If the tourniquet had been removed, he would have died,” the hospital reported.

When Alexander arrived at the hospital, gangrene had already started, with the limb beginning to die.

After the surgery, Alexander shared that he was injured by stepping on a mine. His comrades applied the tourniquet because he couldn’t do it himself. They were only able to evacuate him when the weather worsened, and the Russian drones “paused” for a while.

“I realized on the second day after the injury that I would lose my leg. But I didn’t focus on that. I wanted to live, to be with my family, with my sons. I have two sons. The older is 12, the younger is only 2. That kept me going,” Alexander shared.

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  • During the day, Russians attacked 17 settlements in the Kharkiv region with various types of weapons. The Russian attacks in the region injured six civilians and killed one woman, the Kharkiv police reported.