The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
One specialist machine, two months in ICU and Brian, 47, beats Covid-19
Afather-of-two has thanked NHS Grampian for saving his life after a lengthy battle with Covid.
Brian McBride spent more than two months battling the illness in intensive care – including weeks on a life-saving machine that took over the work of his ailing lungs.
Mr McBride praised the work of NHS Lanarkshire staff, who treated him at University Hospital Monklands, and their NHS Grampian colleagues, who helped save his life using a specialist treatment called ECMO (extra corporeal membrane oxygenation).
The 47-year-old caught Covid in November and spent 10 days in the intensive care unit (ICU) at University Hospital Monklands before doctors decided he needed to be put on a ventilator in an induced coma.
Mr McBride, who lives in Plains, North Lanarkshire, with wife Denise and sons Kai, 16, and Robbie, 11, said: “It was difficult but I don’t think it really sank in at that point.
“I made a video call to Denise to let her know I was going to be ventilated but the boys weren’t on it because it would have been too upsetting.”
Mrs McBride, 42, said: “There were lots of tears but I told him it was the best thing as his body needed time to recover. I told Kai and Robbie that dad was going to be asleep for a while.”
However, the Monklands clinicians soon realised that ventilation was not enough to successfully treat him and they contacted colleagues at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, home to Scotland’s only ECMO machine.
The NHS Grampian team travelled to Lanarkshire and assessed Mr McBride as suitable for ECMO, which allows the lungs to rest and heal. The process transports blood from the body to an oxygenator that, like human lungs, adds oxygen and removes carbon dioxide. The machine then returns the blood to the body via a pump, with the same force as the patient’s own heart.
Mr McBride said: “They took me to Aberdeen on December 2 and I was unconscious on ECMO for a couple of weeks.
“When they brought me round I didn’t know what was going on or where I was – I thought I was in a portable cabin or somewhere in New Zealand or America.”
He continued to receive ECMO after he awoke and he also needed six procedures due to complications with his tracheostomy – the opening in the neck to place a tube in the windpipe.
Mrs McBride was delighted when he was able to make a call on Christmas Day through the NHS Near Me video appointment service. She said: “He couldn’t speak but communicated by writing on a white board. It was a wonderful Christmas gift.”
He came off ECMO on Hogmanay and returned to the ICU at Monklands on January 5. Since being discharged from hospital on January 27, Mr McBride has been slowly regaining the nearly four stone in weight he lost during treatment, and has been continuing exercises to regain his strength after his muscle-sapping ordeal.
“I can’t thank the NHS staff in Lanarkshire and Grampian enough,” he said.
“They were all fantastic and went above and beyond.”
His challenging 73 days in hospital has left the couple counting their blessings. Mr McBride said: “I’m just taking each day as it comes and not thinking too far ahead. Don’t take tomorrow as a given.”