ECMO Therapy: An Advanced Form of Life Support That Saves Lives

Heather Dean was a practicing veterinarian when she began to feel an achy joint pain that landed her in the hospital. Heather’s illness progressed, her lungs began to shut down and by the time she was
Transported to MedStar Washington Hospital Center her heart had stopped. Under the care of Dr. Eziquiel Molina, with MedStar Heart & Vascular Institute and Dr. Mladen Sokolovic, with MedStar Washington Hospital Center, Heather was placed on extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) treatment, an advance form of life support that’s used to restore heart and lung function in patients experiencing cardiac and/or respiratory failure.
MedStar Washington Hospital Center is renowned for its ECMO care in the region. ECMO requires a multidisciplinary team of skilled providers in the ICU to care for patients. Some patients can remain on ECMO treatment for up to 3 weeks. Survival rates for this patient population are successful. Heather was later diagnosed with an autoimmune disease and is recovering. She knows the ECMO device saved her life.
Learn more about MedStar Heart & Vascular Institute: ow.ly/QkYuG
Learn more about Dr. Ezequiel Molina: ow.ly/QkYp3

[@LitaKingsley]

This treatment was given to me in 2019 after overian stage 4 cancer surgery. My overian tumour was 14.5cm , 13 procedures, 2 major cardiac arrests, heart stopped lungs collapsed, brain stopped functioning, kidneys were on dialysis, 5 weeks in ICU, CPR didn't work on me . 3 months in hospital all together. My church was getting ready for my last journey (funeral). all of a sudden one day I'm back to life. Now I'm living a normal life. Lots of parts been removed from my body but I'm still alive because of this treatment.

[@zephirinedrouhin3735]

Wow, praise God that you made it!

[@guanimos1638]

My father had covid 1 year ago, his lungs never truly healed. Now 1 year later he gets the flu, had frequent asthma attacks and now after managing to avoid the medical induced coma by having his oxygen be at 91- he coughed, got put in the coma, day 4 his lungs collapsed and his heart stopped. They revived him 3 times, did a surgery to start correcting his blood circulation and oxygen in the blood stream, watching his kidneys etc etc
... been here at the hospital since 7 a.m. around noon we got updated that he is responding to the surgery well & they want him on ECMO. "Now we go hour by hour and see where this will go". 💩 This ecmo is his and our last hope for life...literally.

[@hemalatharamasamy7760]

In my country,this machine couldn't save the most precious life and this put millions in to grief...😭

[@mandykal]

Amazing how much technology has advanced.... it's a scary thought how many auto-immune conditions can be life threatening....

[@miked.7722]

interesting wonder if Heather Dean went to MSU vet school, if so I met her there in 2017 as an intern.

[@sagnikpanja2000]

Visit Ecmo Kolkata at TH-cam. You'll find a video of ECMO circuit assembling.🙏

[@omg-bh4pg]

How many of these machines are available? Usa needs a few thousand now.

[@Kletenzer]

Hello there! I am a last year medical student. I'm curious. What auto-immune disease did she have?

[@peazy99]

@@somethingbig3797 Just curious. What brings you to that conclusion?

[@holden2966]

It's rheumatic something

[@doodoobrown3928]

Can i use this to keep a bodyless head alive if i inject nutrients? Asking for a guy wanting to put his head in a robot body after they make neurolink..

[@holden2966]

No you can't

[@doodoobrown3928]

@@holden2966 why?

[@sagnikpanja2000]

Ah good thinking. I think there is 50-50 chance of mortality

[@robertoconnell8153]

@@doodoobrown3928 He don't know! Check the ECMO user manual... its gotta have something on sustaining a cyborg head.