Deer Jet Medical to Become China's First Air Ambulance Provider of ECMO Patient Transport

SHENZHEN, China, July 17, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- China's largest air ambulance operator, Deer Jet Medical Co., Ltd., added another first in China and Asia today to its lengthy list of accomplishments accumulated during its two decades' transporting patients in critical care. The company launched a joint program with the Renmin Hospital of Zhongshan City, Guangdong Province, the very first Chinese hospital with expertise to transport patients on portable ECMO (extra corporeal membrane oxygenation) machines, in order to save more lives in the Greater China region.

This means that Deer Jet Medical becomes the only air ambulance operator in China with dedicated jets able to fly ECMO patients nationwide and overseas. ECMO is a technology of providing both cardiac and respiratory support to patients whose heart and lungs are unable to provide an adequate amount of gas exchange to sustain life. Thus, ECMO is mostly used on pediatric patients and adults with cardiac and respiratory failure, it being the sole life-sustaining intervention in such critical situations. This intervention takes on the function of the heart and lungs by routing the patient's blood flow through a machine, where carbon dioxide is removed and oxygen is added before the blood flow is reinfused into the patient body.

Zhongshan City's Renmin Hospital initiated the country's first ECMO program by creating a special task force consisting of experienced anesthesiologists and specialist doctors across different departments several years ago, and has so far evolved into the country's largest ECMO-capable medical center with the capability of treating over 50 ECMO patients per year. As of today, only a very limited number of leading Chinese hospitals have this expertise.

"Both parties intend to create a 'super expressway' in the air to transport patients. However, this is the type of transport that is the most clinically complicated and logistically challenging, if compared with our routine medical evacuation missions. Such a task can only be fulfilled by the best medical crew on board carrying state-of-the-art equipment on the back of guaranteed aviation capability," said Mr. Haikuan Lu, Chairman and CEO of Deer Jet Medical. The medical crew will be composed of international aero medical experts from Deer Jet medical and ECMO specialist doctors from the Remin Hospital.  

"We have to anticipate and plan in advance for every possible contingency because we can afford no error while escorting patients at 10,000 meters in the air," said Mr. Lu, adding that today also marked a significant breakthrough accomplishment by both parties in evacuating critical care patients more efficiently no matter where they are. He further explained that at request, both parties can send medical crew and ECMO equipment in to the bedsides of patients and escort the patients to the most appropriate medical institutions for further treatment.

Mr. Yuan Yong, President of Renmin Hospital, said that transporting patients on ECMO machines represents one of the key indexes to evaluate a country's emergency medicine standard and capability to rescue those critically ill. Renmin Hospital, by taking the initiatives to launch China's first ECMO program, has made unprecedented advancements in treating patients suffering severe myocarditis, sudden cardiac arrest, post-surgical low cardiac output and adult respiratory stress in addition to severe pulmonary obstruction.

Having been widely recognized for its medical excellence in compliance with international emergency medical service (EMS) protocols and strong aviation capabilities, Deer Jet Medical has been in service for almost two decades, transporting most of the country's inbound and outbound patients in need of critical care by its three dedicated Hawker 800 jets. Having set footprints in North America, Europe, Africa, Southeast Asia, Japan and South Korea, Deer Jet Medical is also the sole AA operator having the capability to carry out medical evacuations in high altitude areas such as Tibet. It also set another record in the world's air ambulance industry in recent years by successfully converging an Airbus 319 commercial jet into a "flying ICU" and evacuating 16 traumatic patients out of Vietnam within 18 hours in last May.