A common trope in certain circles (like Eastern martial fiction), is someone com

Question

A common trope in certain circles (like Eastern martial fiction), is someone committing quick suicide by biting his or her tongue. But is this really possible?

The internet turns up millions of pages of speculation, but no Straight Dope. People have been removing the tongues from mammals, and each other, throughout human history. There has to be some scientific data on this somewhere.

Will an untreated, severe, lingual laceration, really result in bleed-out of an otherwise healthy human?

Or will lingual trauma facilitate swallowing the tongue sufficiently to cause asphyxiation?

What does the science say?
Thanks!

Explanation / Answer

I know of an ER doctor who had a patient who removed (by biting and pulling) every last part of her tongue, she survived that (although, her ability to speak was probably shot). The stump of her tongue clotted before she could even go into shock (at least where it was really serious).

Here is a quote from the book Angels in the ER (this is a paramedic speaking with the doc):

"Every bit of it. Gone. And the funny thing, Doc, is it didn't even bleed very much."
The doctor then asked his patient to open her mouth... "it was gone!"

It would certainly be possible to commit suicide doing this if one was a hemophiliac or continued to remove the clot from the hole(s) in their tongue (although the latter could be a potentially painful and I have a feeling that it would take a very, very long time!).

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