Have you ever pondered whether all the work over ECPR was worth it?  Even if you did save a few patients, does this really make sense from a societal standpoint?  Am I giving up my life on a project where my efforts could be better elsewhere?  Then this episode is for you (and me).  This month I talk with Melissa Barnes and Ryan Coute about the economics of cardiac arrest and specifically ECPR.  Ryan has just published a great paper in Resuscitation on the costs on OHCA.  We will talk with Ryan and Melissa Barnes, ECMO manager at Sharp Memorial Hospital about benefits and costs to society of OHCA and ECMO.  I learned several pearls from Ryan's paper as well as a paper by Grosse that Ryan references.  Below are the links to both papers with a couple graphs to try to wrap your head around.

ED ECMO

74: Do 70 year old’s deserve ECPR? A Deep Dive into the Economics of ECPR

Here is the conclusion for the interview of Jan Belohlavek and his Hyperinvasive Trial

73b: Conclusions for Hyperinvasive Trial with Jan Belohlavek

Wait...ECPR works? To the believers, this has been a foregone conclusion.  To the rest of the world, the question of whether ECPR improves cardiac arrest survivorship has been in question. Jan Belohlavek and his Prague colleagues just presented their 8 year data showing better outcomes in cardiac arrest patients that got a grouped therapy of early transport, prehospital hypothermia, mechanical chest compressions, and ECMO over those who got a traditional resuscitation.  This study is key and contrasts to the Oslo study that we reviewed just a few months earlier.  Jan speaks with Zack about the details of the results and what were the keys to their success. Hyperinvasive trial study proposal - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3492121/ Jan's slides on Hyperinvasive Results

73:The Hyperinvasive Trial with Jan Belohlavek

Heparin has been the mainstay of anticoagulation for ECMO patients for years.  In recent years, this has been challenged.  Bivalirudin has b ecome a potential better anticoagulant.  Troy Seelhammer in EDECMO episode 55 gave us some insight into this.  This month Ryan Rivosecchi and his crew at UPitt have released their findings in Critical Care Medicine.  This retrospective study suggests great improvement in major bleeding in patients who received Bivalirudin compare to Heparin (40.7% vs 11.7%, p < 0.001).  Listen to Ryan and Zack discuss anticoagulant use in ECMO patients in this month's episode. Rivosecchi RM, Arakelians AR, Ryan J, Murray H, Padmanabhan R, Gomez H, Phillips D, Sciortino C, Arlia P, Freeman D, Sappington PL, Sanchez PG. Comparison of Anticoagulation Strategies in Patients Requiring Venovenous Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation: Heparin Versus Bivalirudin. Crit Care Med. 2021 Mar 15. doi: 10.1097/CCM.0000000000004944. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33711003. .

72: Should We All Switch To Bivalirudin?

In this episode, we dive into the abyss of resource allocation.  Much of the world is saying that the limited number of ECMO circuits should be used for COVID induced lung injury.  This means that ECPR initiatives have been shut down or severely limited.  Is this the right thing to do?  What does the data say?  What strategy gives the most benefit to the most people?  Zack invited Brian Grunau to discuss these topics as well as a recent ECPR paper out of Norway and study dealing with signs of life during CPR.

71: Should We Prioritize VV-ECMO over ECPR?

In this episode Joe Bellezzo talks with Resuscitative Endovascular Balloon Occlusion of the Aorta (REBOA) expert Zaf Qasim about NON-TRAUMA applications of aortic compression for control of non-compressible non-trauma torso hemorrhage. 

70: REBOA REDUX – Management of Hemorrhagic Shock in Non-Trauma Patients – with Bellezzo & Zaf Qasim

2020 was a crazy year.  This month Zack goes through the biggest ECMO lessons learned in 2020.  This is a short concise run through of ECPR, ECMO for COVID, Imaging, and Aortic Dissection.  It's a reminder of how organization is so critical to the outcome of your ECMO program.  He also reminds us how improvement in these systems of care can lead to survival rates even the believers in ECMO thought were unattainable.

69: 2020 Synopsis

The ARREST Trial is published!  Demetris Yannopoulos, Jason Bartos and their army of rockstars have done it!  This is the first randomized ECPR trial and it showed tremendous benefit of ECPR compared to traditional therapies.  Zack explores this paper and their concurrent publication of process with Demetris.   Their two Lancet papers are below https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)32338-2/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(20)30376-X/fulltext In the news, Jenelle Badulak and her crew at UW saved a hypothermic mountaineer in Seattle.  Story here. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-54959874

68: ARREST – The First Randomized ECPR Trial Ever

Resuscitationist-Initiated Extracorporeal Life Support

hubhopper

ED ECMO

hubhopper