Posted on: Friday, August 23, 2002
Team from San Antonio raises infant survival odds
By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer
Six-day-old Joshua Williams, fighting for breath and placed on a ventilator at Tripler Army Medical Center, faced a 5 to 10 percent chance of survival without more specialized care.
That chance improved dramatically yesterday in the form of the neonatal Critical Care Air Transport Team from Wilford Hall Medical Center in San Antonio — the only response team of its kind in the U.S. military.
The newborn, son of a Tripler-based soldier, suffers from meconium aspiration syndrome in which his own pre-birth fecal matter contaminated his lungs. One to two babies out of 1,000 develop the syndrome, Tripler officials said.
But for little Joshua, there was a complication — persistent pulmonary hypertension, in which blood vessels in the lungs constrict and don't allow normal blood flow.
The Wilford team brought a lifesaver in the form of an "extracorporeal membrane oxygenator," or ECMO. The device circulates an infant's blood through an artificial lung, oxygenating it and adding medication before pumping it back into the child's body.
Maj. Delores Gries, a staff neonatologist at Tripler, said ECMO, which is not available in Hawai'i, gives the heart and lungs a chance to heal, and boosts survival for meconium aspiration syndrome to 90 percent.
"So far, things have been going well," Gries said yesterday.
Joshua was expected to be transported to Lackland Air Force Base in Texas on a C-17 transport with his parents, Gizette and Army Sgt. John Williams, who is with A Company at Tripler.
It was the third time since June 2001 that the San Antonio neonatal team traveled to Hawai'i to treat a newborn in distress. The team had transported an infant as recently as June from Tripler to Wilford Hall.
"These are usually the patients that are very sick and most severe and require significant amounts of support to keep them alive," Gries said. "It's wonderful to have that capability available to us."
Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-5459.
