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Coronavirus: the demand for the helmet they used with Sergio Lapegüe soared

2021-04-29T17:33:36.435Z


It began to be used in the Fernández and reduces the need to intubate the patient by 70%. The case of a family that went into debt to get it.


Javier Firpo

04/27/2021 11:42 AM

  • Clarín.com

  • Society

Updated 04/27/2021 11:42 AM

Raquel Corvalán's blood oxygen saturation was below 70%. He suffered from severe hypoxemia, that is to say, he had serious problems breathing after, days ago, he was detected Covid positive. Diabetic, 68 years old, her outlook was bleak.

She was admitted to the Mariano Moreno clinic in Moreno, where her husband

, Carlos Olivera (73), who died two weeks ago, was also staying. They had been married for 50 years and the two were taken by their children to the hospital on April 1.

Luis (33) and Cristina (39), children of Raquel and Carlos, were desperate for the death of their father and

felt that their mother would face the same fate

.

They moved heaven and earth to prevent her from going to intensive care "because she was not going to endure intubation," explains Luis, who works as head of security in a supermarket.

"I lost my old man and my mother was very sick, she couldn't breathe

. I started to find out and I got the video that the journalist Sergio Lapegüe made with that helmet that gave him oxygen. I said to myself: 'I have to get one to my old lady ', and I was able to reach the manufacturers. "

After a lot of effort,

Carlos got his mother

the Helmet helmet

, which was developed by an Argentine company and is already used in 500 sanatoriums throughout the country.

As if it were a diving suit, this capsule "improves oxygenation and

reduces the need for intubation of patients with Covid 19 by 70%, decompressing the demand for intensive care beds

, one of the

scarcest

resources in the health infrastructure," he says. Guillermo Montiel, pulmonologist and coordinator of the Non-Invasive Ventilatory Support Unit (USoVNI) of the Fernández Hospital.

Regarding the

scarce diffusion of this treatment

, Montiel thinks that "yes it was known but

what there was not was a firm decision to implement it, a little out of fear and a little because the Argentine Society of Intensive Care (SATI) and the Argentine Society of Infectious Diseases (SADI) did not recommend it.

Nowadays the panorama has totally changed: it is used by many provinces and in places like Córdoba they support it intensely.

In the city of Buenos Aires

there is already an order for the hospitals in the red circle to develop a USoVNI

, a measure that will include private clinics. "

Raquel Corvalán with the Helmet, hours after its first use.

On April 14, Luis and Cristina brought the helmet to their mother.

They had pooled their savings and with what they borrowed they reached $ 59,000.

The Ecleris factory, understanding the desperate family situation, gave them to him even though they are worth $ 100,000.

"In the clinic they did not want to know anything about the helmet, they did not agree with this treatment, so it was not used for two days, until seeing the very serious state of my mother's health, they

agreed to try it

", remarks Luis, You just put down $ 15,000 to shrink the debt.

He couldn't believe what was happening to his mother at the time of the helmet use baptism.

"Can you believe that in twenty minutes my old lady revived? I swear we couldn't believe it with my sister, it was as if they had stopped tightening her neck, because that seemed like

the Covid was hanging my mother

. She was the best It was my life's decision to buy the helmet, which she used for two days, because she recovered quickly and although she is still weak, she was discharged a week ago. "

Between relieved and hurt by the departure of his father, Luis has the feeling that "

my old man could have saved himself with the helmet, I'm sure

, but they sent him to therapy and there he stayed."

Lapegüe: "He saved my life"

Involuntary inspirer of Luis Olivera, the journalist Sergio Lapegüe was hospitalized for 21 days and could not avoid intensive therapy, although he was intubation.

"

The doctors decided to make one more attempt, the last one before the tubing

and they put that helmet on me that I had no idea what it was for. I was in another world, I had lost track of time, I just knew that I couldn't breathe ... But when they put the helmet on me,

the situation changed radically and I must admit that it saved my life

, because I was on my way to emptiness, "he says.

Sergio Lapegüe was hospitalized for 21 days in February: "The Helmet helmet saved my life."

Lapegüe, in dialogue with

Clarín

, stresses that "it was not easy or comfortable to use the helmet, which I had on for about six days. First, the noise is deafening, like that of an airplane turbine, but it calmed me down when they put me plugs in your ears. And

it is not easy to have it 12 hours in which you cannot touch your face and you are literally fasting. It

 can be kind of exasperating for a claustrophobic, but it helped me to come back to life. "

The conductor of TN and El Trece remarks that to this day he receives a large number of contacts "to inform them how to get the helmet, especially after the post I made on Instagram back in February. But I am struck by continuing to 

receive a average of 100 daily consultations asking me about the Helmet

, as if I had bought it, something that was not the case, but it means that people saw that I was able to save myself and they want the same outcome for their relatives. "

The photo that Lapegüe shared when, after six days, the Helmet helmet was removed.

The aforementioned pulmonologist Guillermo Montiel makes it known "that

the appearance of the helmets helped us a lot to be able to supply oxygen with pressures higher than atmospheric

, which can be monitored according to the need to inflate the lungs of the patients more or less. This is a new and very important treatment that we have been doing since June at the Fernández Hospital, where the country's first Non-Invasive Ventilatory Support Unit (USoVNI) is located. "

Special helmets for Covid-19 that isolate the patient and protect healthcare personnel.

Montiel points out that, to the surprise, pride and satisfaction of the Fernández medical team, "we were able to observe that

70% of the patients admitted to the USOVNI went home

after implementing this high pressure oxygen treatment. From the beginning of the pandemic, the Helmet occupies a preponderant place, achieving that

less than 30% of the patients end up in intensive care

, which at least gives some relief to our fellow intensivists ".

After verifying that the treatment was successful, Montiel began to communicate the effects of the Helmet "to different provinces, explaining with statistics and fundamentals the essentials of having this tool. And one of the places where it worked best was in Jujuy, but

in places of difficult access like Abra Pampa or the Quebrada de Humahuaca

, where many people were saved ", describes the professional, who comments that he asked the Ecleris factory for ten more units.

The Helmet helmet is used in patients suffering from bilateral pneumonia.

Marcos Ledesma, an otolaryngologist and one of the partners of Ecleris, the company that developed the helmet for non-invasive ventilation in Argentina, reports that in recent weeks "

the demand has grown exponentially

. What at first was somewhat timid, today they are asking us from all over the country, not only from hospitals and clinics, but also from provincial governments and municipalities ".

The Lapegüe case, Ledesma understands, "was symbolic to publicize a treatment like this that little was known about. Now we realize that word of mouth and the health emergency require it. In November and December we manufactured 30 units per month and Today we are around 2,000. Many medical centers that did not want to know anything about this technique,

today please ask us to send them helmets

. "

What is the sudden interest? "It was verified that the Helmet helmet allows effective treatment. At the Fernández Hospital, in the Non-Invasive Ventilatory Support Unit, out of every 100 hospitalized patients with Covid, 70 go home and

80% of those seventy receive the discharge on the seventh day of

hospitalization, "says Ledesma, who says that" each helmet, which costs $ 100,000, is ready to be used by three patients, with the respective cleaning between one and the other. "

It is to highlight in times of exhaustion and shortage of health personnel that "it is a treatment that

does not require specialized personnel

, it is enough to follow the instructions of the 45-minute training via Zoom. For seven patients with these helmets, a clinical doctor, a respiratory kinesiologist and two nurses, as is the Fernández Hospital protocol, "emphasizes Ledesma, who as a doctor says:" Today helmets are

the only option so that people do not drown,

taking into account that beds and therapies are available. full".

ACE

Look also

The lack of oxygen grows in GBA clinics and they seek options to increase production

The experts asked the Government to deepen the controls and evaluate the next 72 hours

Source: clarin

All life articles on 2021-04-29

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