'I was literally dying': UAE doctors give ‘second life’ to critically ill boy on his 20th birthday

A 24-member team of specialists at a hospital in Abu Dhabi have saved the life of a critically ill boy by using extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) – an advanced life support system – on his 20th birthday.

Sajjad Alam was hospitalised at Sheikh Khalifa Medical City (SKMC) with severe respiratory distress because of a common virus.

On admission to the emergency department, he was found to be struggling with his breathing, and his oxygen saturation levels had gone down to 78 per cent. Sajjad had no prior history of illness but his body mass index (BMI) was around 18, indicating he was malnourished. On inspection, it was found that his lungs had failed because of a severe pneumonia that had spread throughout his body. He was shifted to ICU and put on a ventilator the same day. Despite all the efforts, his condition was not improving.

Considering his age and recovery chances, a decision was made to put him on extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) to support his breathing. The treatment uses an artificial heart and lung to support the body when a person’s organs are too sick to do the job.

“ECMO gives patients an opportunity to survive until we resolve the heart or lung failure or replace them if needed. ECMO is the maximum level of life support, it is basically your heart and lungs outside your body,” Dr Mohammed Abdelrehman Shalaby, consultant critical care and adult ECMO lead, SKMC, said.

Birthday on ECMO support

After six days of ventilator support, Sajjad was put on ECMO, on his 20th birthday. The ECMO team consisted of 24 well-trained and experienced specialists that included intensive care physicians, nurses, respiratory therapists, perfusionists, dietitians and physical therapists, providing a multidisciplinary holistic approach to improve the chances of survival.

Explaining the process, Dr Mohammed Amari, division chief of critical care, said: “We provide ECMO support to babies, children, and adults across two ICUs throughout the hospital. ECMO is more than just a sophisticated state-of-the-art machine. It requires significant dedicated time at the bedside, multiple equipment, and highly trained personnel. It also involves close monitoring and round-the-clock intervention and care for patients.”

After almost 10 days on ECMO, Sajjad’s lungs slowly started showing signs of improvement, and infections began to recede. Still, the team at SKMC was unable to start the process of taking him off ECMO because of continuous bleeding in his lungs. Several bronchoscopy procedures had to be performed to remove the clots that had formed in his lungs. After 27 days, Sajjad was finally taken off ECMO support and transferred to the general ward.

‘They saved my life’