State by State: January 2020

NEW MEXICO: Physicians Perform Out-of-Hospital ECMO

Doctors at the University of New Mexico Hospital, Albuquerque Ambulance Service staff, and Albuquerque Fire Rescue announced they treated a patient suffering from cardiac arrest late last year with mobile extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), what they are calling the first of its kind.

“We’re taking that group we were ready to pronounce dead and giving them a 30% chance of surviving with their brain intact,” says Darren Braude, MD, EMS division chief and a professor of emergency medicine at the UNM Health Sciences Center. 

In this case the portable version of the life support system allowed first responders to execute a procedure normally done in a hospital remotely. It was something that had never been done before in the U.S., according to the team.

“Our ECMO program is a nationally recognized program here in the hospital, but we were able to bring this process outside the hospital and offer it now to people outside of a certain bubble of area around university hospital,” says Jon Marinaro, MD, director of the UNM Center for Surgical Critical Care.

Unfortunately the patient in this case did not survive. 

At press time only one AFR ambulance is equipped with ECMO, according to KRQE. It is housed at Station 3 near UNMH, according to the KRQE report.

TEXAS: Austin-Travis County EMS Launches Mobile ‘Safety Lab’

Austin-Travis County EMS (ATCEMS) announced Nov. 20 the launch of the Buckle Up for Life Safety Lab, a new mobile interactive experience designed to educate families on child passenger safety. The lab will travel to neighborhoods across Austin and its surrounding counties, offering safety education and resources around car seat safety from multilingual certified child passenger experts and emergency medical professionals, including video-based training, hands-on practice, education on state safety laws, car seat checks, and free car seats to families in need. 

NEW YORK: FDNY EMS on Alert in November After Threats

A threat against Staten Island FDNY EMS workers surfaced online Nov. 12, prompting an internal message telling EMTs to be aware of their surroundings, according to a Daily News report. An FDNY spokesperson said in an e-mail statement that the department was alerted of an unconfirmed threat and that field units were instructed to stay alert and maintain situational awareness out of precaution. The exact nature of the threat was not divulged.