Covid and Ecmo day 17

[Jackydel2020]

covid and on Ecmo my brother is on day 17 of ventilator and Ecmo! His lungs are not functioning. The doctors have called is 2 days now telling us to make a decision as a family! Mind you all his organs are working fine up to today. We stand firm and will not make a decision soo soon. Has anyone else had doctors try to convince them?! My brother is young 47 and needs time.

[FamilyHistorian]

Hi Jackydel

I wasn’t a COVID patient but had pneumonia followed by a heart operation I was ventilated/ sedated for 6-8 weeks. Whilst my family had the call a couple of times as I wasn’t expected to make it they weren’t asked to make a decision. Fortunately my drs were happy to accept that it may take me some time to come round, which I did, in my own time. I missed Xmas and my 72 birthday but am home now steadily recovering. There are lots of recounts on this site of people taking time to recover.

[Jackydel2020 in reply to FamilyHistorian]

Wow incredible story! Thank you for sharing gives me hope. Doctor don’t call us all week. We get stats from the nurses. Then the weekend doctor call us both sat and Sunday telling us is this a life for your brother!!!!! Are you kidding me!! No no he is only on day 17!!! Wow I’m so 😡

[Sepsur]

There was a moment during my critical care journey and whilst suffering severe ARDS after flu & double pneumonia that the consultant described my lungs as resembling liver not lung, they were so dense. I couldn’t tolerate intubation, so the nurses hand pumped me for a while. Eventually day 57, I woke up and left ICU day 90

[Jackydel2020 in reply to Sepsur]

Wow this is incredible story! She hand pump you! Wow! Inspiring. I pray my brother just needs time! He young 48 and a fighter!

[Ferham]

Hi, find MarthaKos and read her partners story, it's remarkable . Hope you can find support in her post .

[Jackydel2020 in reply to Ferham]

Yes I found her!!! It’s very inspirational and I pray and hope to share her story!!! Thank you 🙏🙏❤️

[stevet11753]

I wonder if doctors who only see the outside ever wonder about what is going on inside: the person inside fighting for their life. They need to have a good look at some of the storys on here. Your brother can become another one 🙏

[Jackydel2020 in reply to stevet11753]

You read my mind!! I was telling my self this too... can these doctors just see other successful stories! I pray that my brother will fight and prove these doctors he can beat this

[Catdancer01]

In early 2019 I was 47 years old, got flu & then pneumonia-very quickly went downhillI, was on ECMO for 3 weeks, in ICU for 3 weeks after that to wake up from induced coma, now, over 18 months later, I am back to how I was before I was ill. I am pretty sure there were some bad points when I was on ECMO, the doctors cannot predict 100% correctly what is going to happen & can come across as very negative sometimes. This I remember from a different experience when I was pregnant for second time & my baby had complete heartblock, there was 1 particular nurse who every week kept saying things looked really bad & he probably wouldn’t make it-he is now nearly 10 years old, functioning normally with his pacemaker-so you never know. Our thoughts are with you.

[Jackydel2020]

Omg thank you for sharing your story! You were the same age as my brother. He is on 3 weeks on Ecmo but has shown any improvement. Like doctors say, he doesn’t get better but he doesn’t get worse. I pray his lungs start to heal.

Im happy to hear you recovered completely goes to show doctors can’t predict everything!