Risky Therapy Saves Coronavirus Patient For 1st Time In Arizona

PHOENIX, AZ — Enes Dedic's lungs were shot. On March 15, the 53-year-old Phoenix man was admitted to HonorHealth's Deer Valley Medical Center after weeks of fever, chills, body aches and nausea. His recent travel abroad had apparently infected him with the new coronavirus, and in a matter of weeks the disease damaged his lungs so badly that, for the first time ever in Arizona, doctors successfully turned to a treatment known as ECMO.

ECMO, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation therapy, is a risky procedure that essentially replaces a patient's lungs and uses an artificial heart to pump the blood back into the body. It's extremely risky, with a success rate of around 50 percent. It requires vast hospital resources. But it's also also been called the "Hail Mary" of coronavirus treatment.

And for Dedic, the risk paid off.

On Monday, HonorHealth announced that Dedic is the first patient in Arizona to survive coronavirus using ECMO treatment.

"This was a complete team effort," Dr. Anselmo Garcia, a pulmonologist and critical care physician, told the Arizona Republic. "There are round-the-clock nurses, respiratory physicians, aides that helped, even housekeeping, just to keep everything going just so that we can maintain the therapy that's needed for one patient on a day-to-day basis."

ECMO, while still rarely used, is gaining momentum as doctors are confronted with the worst-case scenarios for coronavirus patients. Last week, the Food and Drug Administration issued new guidance on ECMO treatment, seeking to expand the availability of the therapy to address the public health emergency.

Dedic's case is one of just a handful of ECMO treatments reported as successful in America. According to news reports earlier this week, ECMO was used to save the life of a 45-year-old emergency physician in Seattle as well as a patient in Chicago.

Dedic remains hospitalized and undergoing further treatment.

>> Read more about Dedic's recovery at the Arizona Republic