--- description: Doctors who used cured pork to stop an uncontrollable nosebleed won an Ig Nobel Prize title: Ig Nobel Prize 2014: Bacon Cured Pork Stopped Nosebleed image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [Newsfeed](/tag/time-section-newsfeed/) ## Newsfeed Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Could Bacon Stop Nosebleeds? by [Melissa Locker](/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Sep 19, 2014 3:53 PM CUT by [Melissa Locker](/author/melissa-locker/) ## Melissa Locker Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Sep 19, 2014 3:53 PM CUT  The 2014 Ig Nobel Prize trophy is hoisted high during a performance at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Harvard University, in Cambridge, Mass., Sept. 18, 2014. Charles Krupa / AP Michigan doctors who used cured pork to stop a nosebleed won a 2014 Ig Nobel prize, [awarded by](http://www.improbable.com/ig/ "undefined") the _Annals of Improbable Research_ magazine at Harvard University for especially imaginative scientific achievements. Dr. Sonal Saraiya and her team at the Detroit Medical Center decided to try the folk remedy as a “last resort” after failed attempts to stop an uncontrollable nosebleed in a 4-year-old who suffers from Glanzmann thrombasthenia, a rare condition in which blood does not properly clot. They stuffed [strips of cured pork](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22224315 "undefined") into the child’s nostrils twice, and the hemorrhaging ceased. Why did it work? “There are some clotting factors in the pork,” she said, [the Associated Press reports](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/7922e0fefcd14b438b27c47d4558273b/ig-nobel-winner-using-pork-stop-nosebleeds "undefined"), “and the high level of salt will pull in a lot of fluid from the nose.” The awards also recognized researchers who explored whether owning a cat is bad for your mental health (it might be), Japanese scientists who studied whether banana peels are actually slippery (they’re not), and Norwegian biologists who set out to discover if people dressed like polar bears could scare reindeers (they can). ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3403537/ig-nobel-prize-2014-cured-pork-nosebleeds/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3403537/ig-nobel-prize-2014-cured-pork-nosebleeds/"},"headline":"Could Bacon Stop Nosebleeds?","datePublished":"2014-09-19T15:53:15.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:48:25.029Z","description":"Doctors have been recognized for using cured pork to stop a 4-year-old's uncontrollable nosebleed","url":"https://time.com/3403537/ig-nobel-prize-2014-cured-pork-nosebleeds/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Science topic","Bacon","health","Food and Beverage"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Melissa Locker","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/melissa-locker/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3403537/ig-nobel-prize-2014-cured-pork-nosebleeds/","name":"Could Bacon Stop Nosebleeds?"}}]}] ```