Morbidity is rising - and hospitals have only 42 active Acmo devices that are the last chance for patients • Doctors warn: "There is not enough manpower to operate the machines"
The Acme team at Sheba Hospital
Photo:
Courtesy of Dr. Kasif
Fighting for the last breath : The second wave of the corona is breaking records in every field, and also on the subject of treatment with the ECMO device, an artificial heart-lung device. To date, 15 patients across the country are connected to such devices, and a total of 42 patients have needed Acme treatment since the outbreak of the corona.
To date, doctors have managed to save the lives of about half of the patients treated with the device. A rate similar to data reported from around the world. These are relatively young patients who were in a humane condition - respirated and anesthetized and later in a deteriorating trend. The Acme device is actually the last chance for critically ill patients for whom the soul is not helpful.
Photo: GPO
The device is found in limited quantities in Israel: at the outbreak of the corona, there were 35 devices in Israel. We are now announcing that in recent weeks another 17 devices have been added out of 30 more that the state has ordered, but not all of them are available for use yet. Hospitals, including Assuta in Ashdod, Kaplan in Rehovot and Meir in Kfar Saba, will receive a device for the first time.
According to the data in the first wave of the corona until the end of May, there were 19 patients in a human condition that the soul did not help and needed a device. Three died during the connection to the device. Of the 16 patients who were helped by Acme, eight have recovered and are now in respiratory rehabilitation or at home and eight have died.
Now, in the second wave, the device has been installed in the bodies of 23 patients, and 15 are still connected to it. Assistance with the device is appropriate when it comes to a respiratory patient, who even the high-pressure respirator is no longer able to help his lungs.
The connection to the machine is complex and is made surgically: tubes are inserted into the patient's blood system and the blood is pumped into a machine that oxidizes it and returns it to the bloodstream - allowing the patient's lungs and heart to recover.
Not only corona patients are helped by Acme. This is also done in children after heart surgery, in cases of childbirth with pulmonary embolism, in cases of severe flu in young patients and more.
"Hakmo has become a very important player in Corona, it is a real life-saving device. This investment of resources and money justifies itself because it saves people," says Dr. Yigal Kasif, senior heart surgeon and director of the Hakmo service at Sheba and chairman of the Israeli company Lakmo. "We see people surviving and getting back to being active. We are currently in the midst of a very high wave and there is a lot of help between hospitals, but the cost of Acme treatment is that hospitals are forced to reduce beds in intensive care."
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According to him, while in normal time one brother or sister is needed for the device, in Corona the ecmo device becomes a "hysterical labor consumer": "In Corona the problem is complicated with protection. It is very difficult to have eight hours of shift with it. Nurses do two rounds of two hours and more "That means double the manpower. Right now Sheba is standing on four Acme patients at the same time. The hospital management has ruled that we can not get another patient over three, but I can not ignore if a patient in the bed next door will have to. We are collapsing and falling off our feet."
Dr. Hagai Dekel, director of the Acme Unit at Wolfson, added: “Once we understand that the patient is in critical condition we connect him to Acme. So far, most of our patients have recovered fairly quickly and we have been able to repay them. "
