First Successful Lung Transplant for Domestic COVID-19 Patient... 9th Worldwide

[Asia Economy Reporter Cho Hyun-ui] The first successful lung transplant surgery for a severe COVID-19 patient in South Korea has been performed. It is the ninth case worldwide.

On the 2nd, Hallym University Sacred Heart Hospital announced that on the 21st of last month, they successfully performed a lung transplant surgery on a woman in her 50s whose lungs had developed fibrosis due to COVID-19. This marks the first case of lung transplantation for a COVID-19 patient in South Korea, following cases in China, the United States, and Austria.

The patient is a woman in her 50s who was confirmed positive on February 29 and had been hospitalized for about four months. From the time of admission, her condition was severe enough to require both a ventilator and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), an artificial heart-lung machine. The hospital administered the antimalarial drug chloroquine and the AIDS treatment drug Kaletra, but these showed no significant effect.

The patient tested positive for COVID-19 only once in early March after admission, and all subsequent tests were negative, with a final negative result at the end of April. Although the virus had disappeared from her body, the problem was that pulmonary fibrosis, which causes the lungs to harden, had progressed.

Due to lung damage, the patient received ECMO treatment for 112 days, from March 1, the day after admission, until June 20, the day before the lung transplant surgery. This is the longest ECMO treatment period recorded worldwide for a COVID-19 patient. A representative from Hallym University Sacred Heart Hospital explained, "The lung function was so severely damaged that the risk of death was high the moment ECMO was removed. There was no option but lung transplantation."

Despite the prolonged ECMO treatment, the lung transplant surgery was successfully completed. The hospital cited the proactive use of ECMO treatment, prevention of complications such as infection, bleeding, and thrombosis caused by ECMO, and 24-hour intensive care to manage the patient's diet and physical deterioration as key factors behind the successful surgery.

The patient has now recovered enough to breathe independently. She is also undergoing rehabilitation exercises to rebuild muscle strength weakened by prolonged bed rest.

Kim Hyung-su, head of the ECMO Center and professor of thoracic surgery at Hallym University Sacred Heart Hospital, said, "This was the best severe treatment case for a COVID-19 patient in South Korea. Even young and healthy COVID-19 patients can require lung transplantation if pulmonary fibrosis progresses, so please do not be complacent because of youth and continue efforts such as social distancing and wearing masks."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.