ORLANDO, Fla. – You wouldn’t think you could live when both your heart and lungs are failing, but there is technology that makes it possible, and the first and only program of its kind in Central Florida is now offering new hope for patients.
AdventHealth and Orange County invited News 6 into an emergency room in Orlando to see how the hospital is teaming up to provide life-saving treatment for cardiac arrest patients.
“What we have developed is protocol and a program in partnership where we will rapidly identify patients who meet certain criteria for this, and then expedite their transport here for next level, cutting-edge care that involves bypass for patients in cardiac arrest,” said Dr. Christian Zuver, medical director for the Orange County Emergency Medical Services System.
[WATCH BELOW: How a partnership is helping more cardiac arrest patients beat the odds and achieve life-saving results]
Zuver says first responders are now communicating directly with hospital staff and will provide automatic CPR to patients while in transit. Once they arrive at AdventHealth Orlando, a team of people will be ready and waiting to hook them up to an ECMO (Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation machine), which can support their heart and lungs, right in the ER.
“As soon as we get the call, we have a system that activates an entire team of providers, which includes intensivists, surgeons, ER personnel (and) ECMO specialists that run the heart-and-lung machine,” said Dr. Eduardo Oliveira, executive medical director of critical care services for AdventHealth Central Florida. “It’s a team of about 20 providers that are going to be waiting for the patient.”
Oliveira showed News 6 how the automated CPR and ECMO technology work together, which gives them the time to find out what’s going on. It’s critical support in an emergency situation where every second counts.
ECMO is an advanced life support system that essentially takes over the functions of the heart and lungs. Blood is pumped through an ECMO machine, which adds oxygen and removes carbon dioxide before returning it to the body.
“We are basically doing it artificially,” Oliveira said. “We move the blood around the body. We give the patient a blood pressure, even when the heart is not functioning. So, we take over control of breathing as well as the heart function.”
Research shows extracorporeal membrane oxygenation CPR can save lives when patients who meet certain criteria are given the right care at the right time. To qualify, a patient must be 18-70 years old, with no terminal conditions, and be no more than 45 minutes away from AdventHealth Orlando
“Typically, when somebody suffers an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest the prognosis is not great. The mortality numbers are pretty high, Zuver said. “You can have up to 30% more patients surviving because of this versus regular standard of care for cardiac arrest.”
Currently, this is the only facility in Central Florida with this kind of ECPR program. Staff at AdventHealth and Orange County told News 6 that they’ve already seen it get results.
“This is cutting-edge. There’s not a lot of places around the country that are doing this,” Zuver said. “This will save lives, absolutely.”
You can read more information from AdventHealth below:
AdventHealth has one of the largest ECMO programs in the country, with 32 adult beds, 10 pediatric beds, 28 adults ECMO specialists, and more than 250 specially trained team members including advanced practice providers, physicians, nurses, pharmacists, respiratory therapists and support staff. The program gained national prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, treating patients while significantly exceeding the national average survival rate.
The program launched in late March, operating from 7 a.m.-7 p.m. Once additional staff are trained, the program will expand to 24/7 availability.