ECMO

“This tiny pool of blood settled over the nerves that control the motor function of my left leg. So, initially, my only symptom was that my left leg was paralyzed,” recalls Linda Hatcher, a stroke survivor and member of the Neurosurgery Patient and Family Advisory Council at UCLA Health. “The [...]

In a twisted turn of events, the same way Sheriff Cosby was able to quickly respond and serve his community, in-turn he received the same attention to care and quick response to save his life.

“I never thought I would be able to ride dirt bikes or BMX again,” says 22-year-old Casey Child, who came in to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center thinking he had the flu. “I was diagnosed with giant cell myocarditis, which is a rare autoimmune disease. I was on the extracorporeal [...]

“A few times in a physicians career there will be these transcendental moments that shape and inspire us,” says Dr. Michael Yeh, a surgeon at UCLA who was working on Father’s Day when a unique patient came in. “His blood pressure dropped suddenly in the middle of the night, so [...]

“I was at a barbeque when I got the call to mobilize our extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) team,” says Dr. Peyman Benharash, pictured left, director of the adult ECMO program at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. The patient, Matt Pohlson, pictured center, had just suffered stress-induced cardiomyopathy, or heart [...]

“We are able to deliver an advanced therapy which replaces the function of the heart and lungs in a patient whose organs are failing,” says Dr. Peyman Benharash, associate professor of surgery and bioengineering and director of the adult extracorporeal membrane oxygenation program at UCLA. “The ECMO machine allows the [...]

“My mom came out of the elevator and heard ‘he’s code blue, he’s code blue,’ and she walked to my room where I had flat-lined,” says Matt Pohlson, who came to the hospital thinking he might have appendicitis. “I went to UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica and they could tell [...]