Melania Bembea, director of the extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) program at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, discusses ECMO hematologic emergencies, which was the subject of her presentation during the Hot Topics in ECMO session at the Eighth World Congress of Pediatric Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery. ECMO is a life support technology that provides extracorporeal support for infants, children and adults who are critically ill and who have with severe cardiopulmonary failure or cardiac arrest that is refractory to conventional therapies. Although this technology is life saving, it is has a high risk of adverse events. During the presentation, Bembea highlighted multiple strategies that can reduce hematologic emergencies during ECMO support, along with ongoing studies using novel transfusion strategies and innovative circuit modifications.
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