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EDECMO 44: Bob Bartlett: Peristaltic Pumps, Hollow Fibers, and the History of ECMO

Posted on March 21, 2018 // 1 Comment

In this episode, Zack interviews Bob Bartlett from the University of Michigan.  He is truly the godfather of ECMO and has revolutionized the world with his leadership and innovation.  They discuss the history of ECMO and roller pumps and bubble oxygenators were clearly inferior to their current counterparts – centrifugal pumps and hollow fiber oxygenators.  They also discuss anticoagulation and how Bob feels direct thrombin inhibitors are superior.  They also discuss the future of ECMO and how peristaltic pumps may be where we are headed.  

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EDECMO 43: The Cutdown

Posted on February 20, 2018 // 1 Comment

In this episode,  Alice Hutin of the Paris SAMU talks about the modified cutdown approach to cannula insertion.  She is an emergency physician who is one of four physicians who take call on the pre-hospital ECMO ambulance.  She describes the process of their modified cutdown.  First, incision through the skin is made 2 cm below inguinal crease.  Second, blunt dissection down through the soft tissue.  This is best done with your fingers.  Third, place a needle through the distal skin and visualize it pass into the vessel.  From there, you cannulate as with percutaneous.  Alice’s recent paper shows a 6% failure rate with this technique in skilled hands.

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EDECMO 42: Organ Transplantation On ECMO

Posted on January 16, 2018 // 2 Comments

http://media.blubrry.com/edecmo/p/traffic.libsyn.com/edecmo/OG3_post_auphonic.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:07 — 26.2MB)Subscribe: RSS  In this episode, we tackle the subject of organ transplantation on ECMO.  2017 featured several articles showing the efficacy of ECMO for organ transplantation.  In Italy, 56% of total potential patients were successfully transplanted.  The success of these transplants have been comparable to […]

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EDECMO 41 – The 3 Stages of ECPR – Diane’s Story

Posted on December 29, 2017 // 1 Comment

In this episode Zack and Joe discuss the 3-stages of Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) – or put another way, this is how to start Extracorporeal Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (ECPR) in the Emergency Department (ED). It’s been 4 years since we talked about these basic premises of ECPR. But this time, its highlighted in a very special story.

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EDECMO Episode 41 is REPOSTED

Posted on December 12, 2017 // 1 Comment

The original post for EDECMO 41 had to be permanently removed from the internet (for reasons beyond our control!!!) but its back. Click this link to take you to the new and improved (and HIPAA-compliant!!) episode: EDECMO 41 – The 3 stages of ECMO – Diane’s Story

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EDECMO 40: EROCA – The trial that asks “Should ER Docs Initiate ECPR?”

Posted on November 2, 2017 // Leave a Comment

http://media.blubrry.com/edecmo/p/traffic.libsyn.com/edecmo/Take_3_Gunnerson.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:36 — 23.0MB)Subscribe: RSS   EROCA – University of Michigan – Gunnerson/Shinar Should Emergency Physicians initiate ECMO on arresting patients?  That is the question that Kyle Gunnerson from the University of Michigan (UMich) is asking with their new trial – EROCA.  UMich has had a robust ECMO […]

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2016 ECMO CPT Codes, RVUs, and MediCare Reimbursement

Posted on October 14, 2017 // 2 Comments

Ok, so we just crashed an arrested patient onto ECMO and he is going to the cath lab. Now, how do I document the procedure again?  What was the CPT for percutanous cannulation for VA-ECMO?  Does my billing company even know? 

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EDECMO 39: Who Do We Put On ECMO? – New Data on Prognostics

Posted on October 6, 2017 // 2 Comments

In this episode Zack interviews the first authors of the three biggest papers this year dealing with the question of “Who should I put on ECMO?”  Guillaume Debaty of Grenoble, France published a paper outlining what prognostic factors are important.  Guillaume’s data shows importance of short low times, lower lactates and higher pH values.  The real question is what number for each of these should we consider a hard stop on initiation.  This is followed up by Josh Reynolds who along with Ben Singer out of the UK published a paper utilizing cardiac arrest data from the PRIMED trial.  He showed that even patients with all the advantageous characteristics of traditional ECMO inclusion criteria had poor survivals once they have had >30 minutes of chest compressions.  With many ECMO studies having average arrest to

initiation times of > 60 minutes, Josh’s paper certainly makes us view favorably the 30% survival outcomes that we are seeing worldwide.  This in no way substitutes for a randomized trial but does offer some guidance on what the expected survival of a patient with a witnessed arrest, short low flow times, and age < 65.   We  conclude with Nate Haas out of the University of Michigan who utilitzed the ELSO database to show that age was not predictive of survival.  This may push us towards including older patients in our inclusion criteria, but more data is definitely needed on this.

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REANIMATE 4 Mashup Video!

Posted on September 24, 2017 // 1 Comment

REANIMATE 4 was THE best conference event I’ve ever had the pleasure to be associated with!  Take a look at this short video mashup of the entire event (and thanks to Jeremy Haywood, our videographer, video editor, and video producer)

For those of you who attended, thank you for bringing your “A-Game”!  Ya’ll came prepared and motivated! Your energy and devotion has completely re-energized us!  It was a little bittersweet when we all had to part ways on Friday. But welcome to the REANIMATE family!

If you couldn’t make it to “R4”, now’s the time to register for REANIMATE 5, which will be March 8-9, 2018 in San Diego.

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Crash Episode: Iowa OHCA ECMO Save – with Andrew Karl Terry

Posted on September 7, 2017 // 5 Comments

Mini episode – This is a great example of where a little persistence with your colleagues can help save someone’s life.  Dr. Andrew Karl Terry, having had only limited exposure to ECMO, was able to encourage his Cardiologists to put a witnessed VF patient on ECMO.  The rest is history!

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