CHENNAI: Doctors in a Chennai hospital have said they can bring many people back to life even an hour after their hearts stop with the help of trained staff and right equipment.
âA cardiac arrest is the same as death. Heart has to stop for doctors to declare death. But in many cases we have been able to reverse it before too much cell damage,â said heart transplant surgeon in Fortis Malar Hospital Dr K R Balakrishnan.
The critical care team in the hospital, he says, has woken up 13 of the 19 critically ill patients who suffered cardiac arrest in the hospital. Some patientâs hearts picked up nearly 75 minutes after cardiac arrest, he said.
The hospital added extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) to its routine cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) process. ECMO is a system in which blood from a person who has had a cardiac arrest is taken and circulated through a membrane oxygenator, which supplies oxygen and removes carbon dioxide. The oxygenated blood is put back into circulation. âThe machine is now part of our crash cart thatâs dragged when the patient has a cardiac arrest,â said head of critical care Dr Suresh Rao.
To make process simple, the hospital has developed protocols where they keep the arteries near the groin ready in high risk patients. The doctors do the chest compressions and give the right drugs, but if they still donât get the desired oxygen levels, then they connect the patient to ECMO. âWe can do this in the ward, ICU or theatre. We work like men in F1 pit stops, where damaged tyres are changed within a few seconds. Each one has a job and they do it in perfect synchrony,â said Dr Balakrishnan.
If the patient needs support for a longer time, ECMO is connected directly to blood vessels of the heart.
Starting an ECMO, however, can cost patients up to Rs 5 lakh. âIn some cases insurance and governments have paid. We have also tried to crowd source funds with the help of NGOs,â he said. The hospital is working with NGOs such as Aishwariya Trust to fund surgeries for the needy.
