At first, C. Balasundaram and his wife thought their daughter merely had a throat infection. Five days later, 12-year-old Soubhashree could not sit, and had to be admitted to a hospital in Puducherry, where the family lived. Doctors told her parents she was in a critical condition – she had H1N1 (swine flu) and the oxygen levels in her lungs were dangerously low.
Her parents then decided to shift her to Apollo Children’s Hospitals in Chennai. “By the time we got to her, heart failure had begun and we were worried about brain damage. At the hospital, she was immediately put on ECMO – Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation,” said Indira Jayakumar, senior consultant, emergency care.
ECMO, explained K. Madhan Kumar, senior consultant cardiothoracic surgeon, is a temporary artificial heart lung machine that does the job of the lungs and is used to give time to the body’s organs to rest and recover. The device is used in cases of severe respiratory distress — but when the condition is reversible. “But patients have to come in early – it’s only then that we get good results,” said Dr. Jayakumar.
For 19 days, Soubhashree was on ECMO and a month-and-a-half later, she was discharged. Three months down, the 12-year-old is back on her feet. Doctors said this was the first time ECMO had been used in the country to cure a child of H1N1. Apollo has used the technology with 32 adults and 9 paediatric patients.
The cost of the device is very high – between Rs. 40,000 to Rs. 75,000 per day. To help Soubashree’s parents with the expenses and also other parents whose children may need ECMO, the hospital has launched Apollo CARES – Children Advanced Respiratory ECMO Support, a fund that will take donations from philanthropists, the hospital and companies to help children under the age of 16 who need ECMO, said Paul Ramesh, senior consultant cardiothoracic surgeon. Maquet, a company that manufactures the device, contributed one ECMO machine, worth Rs. 30 lakh for the use of children at the hospital.
Vice-chairperson Preetha Reddy thanked Soubashree’s family for their trust in the hospital. Chairman Prathap C. Reddy also participated.
