"Hi everyone, I want to share my ECMO story. I was on VV ECMO for 40 days and spent 65 days in the hospital. I experienced many complications and it’s a lot to unpack, but I hope sharing it helps others feel less alone in their own battles. It all started on March 3, 2025, when I tested positive for the flu after visiting urgent care. I returned later that same day because I was vomiting, coughing, and running a 102° fever that wouldn’t come down even with Tylenol and ibuprofen. My oxygen levels were okay, my heart rate was elevated, but the doctor wasn’t too concerned. I’m 24, relatively healthy, and have no pre-existing conditions, he told me I just needed rest. That night, I couldn’t sleep at all. The next day, still feeling awful and now with chest pain, I called an at-home urgent care service. I didn’t go to the ER, thinking, “I already went to urgent care twice.I must just be really sick.” But the moment the home care team arrived, they called an ambulance. My oxygen had dropped to 82%, and who knows how long it had been that low. I was admitted to the first hospital on March 4th in the evening. They tried everything to raise my oxygen levels, but nothing worked. I was diagnosed with severe pneumonia which was “basically everywhere” in my lungs and they told me they needed to intubate me and put me on a ventilator. I was terrified. Just 48 hours earlier, I’d been walking and talking. Now I was being sedated and ventilated. That was the last part of my story I was awake for. From that point forward, I was in a medically induced coma for over a month. Even on the ventilator, my oxygen wouldn’t improve. I was transferred to a specialized pulmonary hospital and placed on VV ECMO on March 5. They had to change my cannula sites twice due to bleeding and movement. Around March 18, they decided to do a tracheotomy to avoid long-term vocal damage from the breathing tube, it was complicated, but eventually successful. They also began testing to see if my lungs were ready to function without ECMO. But during this process, one lung collapsed, then the other followed shortly. Chest tubes were placed, and I remained on ECMO. Throughout it all, my fever stayed dangerously high. I relied on the Arctic Sun cooling constantly. At some point early on, I don’t know the exact date, they placed a PEG tube, but it clogged and had to be replaced on April 2. Then, it dislodged into my abdominal wall on April 21, and was replaced again on April 25. Because of my many reactions and complication, my team had to constantly adjust my treatment and medications. For example, I had severe bleeding from all cannula sites, and even from my nose and eyes. They avoided blood thinners, fearing it would increase my bleeding but also worried clots could form in the ECMO machine. Thankfully, that didn’t happen. One small but emotional thing, my hair became so matted that they had to cut most of it off. They began clamping the ECMO on April 12, and I responded well. On April 14, I was officially removed from ECMO. Then they began reducing sedation. I don’t remember my first conscious moments,but I started having “awake moments” soon after being taken off of ECMO. My first memory is April 17, I used a speaking valve on my trach for the first time. By April 20, I started trying the trach collar, and on April 24, they removed the trach altogether. I was transferred out of the ICU on April 26, into a standard hospital room where I began physical therapy and more recovery. My PEG tube was removed on May 5, and I was discharged on May 7. Mentally, this experience was incredibly hard. Tons of anxiety, crying and pain. I’ve since started anxiety medication, and it’s helping a lot. I’m doing very well now, walking without a walker and needing only 0.5 to 1 liter of oxygen. I still have some nerve damage in my forearms and hands, but my primary doctor believes that will improve over time as inflammation goes down. I’ve lost a lot of hair, but that’s not permanent. Apart from general weakness and deconditioning, I have full control of my body, and my cognitive function is completely intact (which was a big worry)This experience changed me in ways I’m still understanding. I was in a coma. I was on life support. I was bled, cut open, and hooked up to machines that breathed and ate for me. But I’m here. And I’m healing. If anyone has questions or is going through something similar, please reach out. I have so much more to share and I know how isolating this can feel. You are not alone."

"My entire life, I have struggled with asthma and an anaphylactic food allergy. As I grew older, and my asthma became more uncontrolled- I was warned by several doctors that it was something that should never be taken lightly. Although manageable, asthma sneaks up on nearly 4,000 people yearly resulting in death or severe hospitalization. I never once thought I could be a part of that number. Thanksgiving was coming up. November 21st, I felt ill. I mean, nothing out of the ordinary, sniffly, maybe a bit achy,- and of course, feeling like I was breathing through a straw. My mother quickly rushed me to the ER when I could not take a full breath. As the hours went on, nothing the doctors were trying was working, and I continued to decline despite all efforts. That is when the panic set in, when the normal treatments were not putting a dent in my breathing. I was hypercarbic and hypoxic at this point and in full status asthmaticus, and respiratory failure. It was time to be intubated. The last thing I remember is the removal of the Bipap mask, and then I was out. In a medically induced coma and on ECMO for 4 days, and in the ICU for 8. I woke up days later to the foreign feeling of a plastic tube down my throat, completely bewildered. Where was I? What had happened? Was the TV really speaking to me in Spanish? Did my nurse really turn into a lizard? I was out of it to say the least.  When I woke for the final time, I was extubated. It was explained to me that I went into acute hypercapnic respiratory failure with pneumonia, Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS), and suffered a collapsed lung as well as a staph infection. I was intubated, and ventilated, but this had failed. Exhausting all other options, my doctors placed me on ECMO, however I was still declining and needed a chest tube due to the collapse of my lung. When I learned what I had been through, it was a shock. Every single fiber of my being was changed. I owe my life to the team who saved me- and to ECMO. I am now working in an Emergency Room in Nashville, helping and empathizing with patients everyday and have worked in hospitals for almost 2 years. I am working towards my degree in medicine and hope to one day be a critical care physician. I am so thankful that I am here to share my story and let you all know- it gets better, and you are NOT alone."