KMCH Achieves Milestone in Advanced Critical Care
In 2025, KMCH achieved a major milestone in advanced critical care, performing 75 ECMO runs, the highest number in Tamil Nadu.
We never think about our next breath.
We wake up, get ready for work, drop our children at school, call our parents, laugh with friends, and plan for tomorrow. Our heart keeps beating. Our lungs keep working. Life moves forward, almost unnoticed.
Until one day, someone we love struggles to breathe.
A husband waits outside the ICU for news about his wife. A daughter watches doctors fight to save her father. A family prays for one more chance.
Inside the ICU, every second matters.
Sometimes, even with a ventilator and powerful medicines, a patient’s lungs or heart may be too weak to do their job. The body needs more help. The medical team needs another way to support life while treating the illness.
That is where ECMO comes in.
It is an advanced life-support treatment that temporarily helps perform the work of the heart, the lungs, or both. Blood passes through a specialised machine that adds oxygen and removes carbon dioxide before returning it to the body.
In simple words, when the heart or lungs need help, ECMO can help keep the blood supplied with oxygen while doctors fight the illness.
It is complex, intensive treatment, suitable only for carefully selected patients. It cannot promise recovery. But in the right circumstances, it can provide crucial support.
And in 2025, KMCH, Coimbatore, reached a remarkable milestone in delivering this treatment.
75 ECMO runs. The highest number in Tamil Nadu.
Seventy-five.
Not just a number on a hospital report. It represents 75 occasions in a single year when KMCH provided this highly specialised form of life support to critically ill patients.
In 2025, KMCH performed 75 ECMO runs, the highest number in Tamil Nadu, according to the hospital’s reported figures.
The achievement builds on more than five years of experience, with KMCH completing over 200 ECMO runs during that period.
Why Does This Matter?
Because ECMO is not a treatment that can be delivered by simply switching on a machine. It requires advanced equipment, specialised intensive care facilities, experienced medical professionals, and continuous monitoring. Every patient needs careful assessment, and every treatment decision matters.
KMCH’s achievement reflects its experience and capability in managing some of the most challenging situations in critical care.
For a family facing the terrifying uncertainty of a loved one’s critical illness, access to specialised medical expertise can be an important part of understanding the treatment options available.
When the patient cannot safely travel, critical care must travel with them.
KMCH’s milestone does not stop at the hospital doors.
A critically ill patient may sometimes need ECMO support available at a specialised centre. But moving a patient whose heart or lungs are failing can be extremely challenging.
KMCH addresses this need through its specialised ECMO Ambulance Service, which enables its team to reach eligible patients and facilitate transfers while maintaining ECMO support when clinically appropriate.
KMCH reports that it is the second hospital in Tamil Nadu to offer this advanced facility.
This is more than an ambulance journey. It involves specialised equipment, trained professionals, and careful coordination to support the patient throughout the transfer.
It brings another important capability to critical care: helping patients access specialised treatment even when getting to the hospital presents a serious challenge.
A Milestone Measured in Experience
The importance of KMCH’s achievement is not simply that it performed 75 ECMO runs in one year.
It is that the hospital has developed the specialised resources and experience needed to provide this demanding form of life support.
For the general public, ECMO may be an unfamiliar word. But the reason it exists is easy to understand: sometimes, the body needs help to keep going while doctors treat a serious illness.
ECMO is not suitable for every patient, and outcomes can never be guaranteed. When a critically ill patient’s condition is not improving, families can speak with the treating doctor about whether an ECMO specialist evaluation is appropriate. Early discussion may help determine whether this treatment is a suitable option.
In the end, the greatest achievement in medicine is never just a machine, a procedure, or a number.
It is the commitment to be prepared when a patient needs highly specialised care.
In 2025, KMCH recorded 75 ECMO runs, the highest number in Tamil Nadu according to its reported figures. It is a significant milestone in the hospital’s continuing work in advanced critical care.
Because every breath matters.
And when life becomes a fight for that next breath, the right expertise and the right support matter, too.
KMCH, Coimbatore, advancing the possibilities of critical care.
Need an ECMO Evaluation or Specialist Opinion?
If a loved one is critically ill and is not responding adequately to conventional treatment, speak with the treating physician about whether an ECMO evaluation is appropriate.
KMCH ECMO Team: 0422-4323647 / 0422-4323195
ECMO is a specialised life-support treatment for selected patients. Suitability, risks, and outcomes vary according to the patient’s condition and must be assessed by the treating medical team.
