Coronavirus: Hong Kong uses artificial lungs to treat Covid-19 patient for first time
- Life-support device fixed to critically ill woman, 75, who had travelled to North America
- Only one local infection among 16 new cases taking Hong Kong total to 989 on Friday
Artificial lungs have been fitted to a coronavirus patient for the first time in Hong Kong, health officials said on Friday, as 16 new infections took the city total to 989.
The prosthetic device – which provided life support to patients with respiratory failure and was also known as extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) – was used for a critically ill 75-year-old woman whose condition worsened while in intensive care, the authorities said.
“She [the patient] relied on ventilators to assist breathing but her condition worsened,” said Dr Sara Ho Yuen-ha, the Hospital Authority official in charge of patient safety. “Doctors today decided to use ECMO as part of the treatment. The operation [of the device] will be monitored by an expert panel.”
Ho said public hospitals had 20 of the devices available, which provided oxygen and removed carbon dioxide from the blood.
The elderly patient, who is being treated at Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital in Chai Wan, travelled to the United States and Canada in February and showed Covid-19 symptoms from March 24.
Professor David Hui Shu-cheong, a respiratory medicine expert at Chinese University, said artificial lungs were a temporary measure to help provide oxygen to patients suffering from respiratory failure due to serious pneumonia, adding they were used when mechanical ventilation was insufficient.
