Wounded Soldier saved through use of heart, lung machine

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Scott T. Sturkol
  • Air Mobility Command Public Affairs
SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, Ill. (AFNS) --  A wounded Soldier incurred an injury that affected his lungs, and was transported on an aeromedical evacuation mission Oct. 21, from Afghanistan to Germany.

The mission was carried out aboard a C-17 Globemaster III, with the use of an extra-corporeal membrane oxygenation machine.

"This is the first time an adult has moved with this support in the aeromedical evacuation system, but not the first ECMO patient to be moved," said Col. (Dr.) William Pollan, the Air Mobility Command deputy Surgeon General at Scott Air Force Base, Ill.

The complete the mission required two aircraft due to the requirements of the patient, said Capt. Sarah Evans, the chief of airevac operations for the 618th Air and Space Operations Center.

"The specialized lung team originated out of Germany and had to be prepositioned to get the patient ready for flight," Captain Evans said. "A second aircraft was used to lift the team and patient back to Ramstein (AB, Germany)."

According to a 59th MDW Public Affairs news report, the ECMO machine provides cardiac and respiratory support primarily to eligible infants and children whose heart and lungs are so severely diseased or damaged that they can no longer serve their function. Wilford Hall Medical Center, at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas, provides the only long distance ECMO transport option in the world. 

"We have been moving neonates (newborns) for a number of years using this capability," Colonel Pollan said.

The 59th MDW report also addressed the new effort to use the ECMO machine with adult patients, particularly on airevac missions.

An official from Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio said they performed a review of the Joint Theater Trauma Registry for all combat casualties and found there were a number of patients who had "very severe lung injuries" who "might have benefited from ECMO."

"We're using that as motivation to expand our existing capability to now be able to take care of adult patients with the same technology," said Lt. Col. (Dr.) Jeremy Cannon, the medical co-director of the surgical intensive care unit at BAMC.

"I foresee you will be seeing more and more of these adult moves as success stories such as this past week are read about," Dr. Pollan said. "This capability is not restricted to (airevac), but can be on any conveyance."

Lt. Col. (Dr.) Raymond Fang, the trauma director for Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany and the U.S. Air Force Critical Care Air Transport Clinical Director in Europe, said use of the ECMO machine in the future has possibilities.

"ECMO is an extremely specialized capability available at very few medical centers worldwide," Dr. Fang said. "I do not know that it can ever truly be a standard tool worldwide, but a potential goal is to place the capability at select military treatment facilities to support potential (airevac) requirements worldwide. This is akin to what the Wilford Hall pediatric ECMO team does to support global requests."

(Staff Sgt. Robert Barnett, from 59th Medical Wing Public Affairs; and Capt. Justin Brockhoff, from 618th AOC Public Affairs; contributed to this article.)