Successful treatment of massive pulmonary embolism using a pulmonary artery catheter during prolonged normothermic cardiopulmonary resuscitation

Massive pulmonary embolism has a high mortality rate. Standard treatment includes systemic thrombolysis. If this fails, surgical embolectomy or a percutaneous catheter-guided approach is advised in current guidelines. However, these treatment options might not be available in many non-tertiary care hospitals. We describe a case of a 25-year old woman with cardiac arrest from massive pulmonary embolism. She was treated with thrombus fragmentation using a pulmonary artery catheter and intra-pulmonary thrombolysis after failure of systemic thrombolysis along with 90 minutes of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Neurological recovery was excellent and pulmonary pressure was normalized after one month. Besides catheter guided thrombus fragmentation and thrombolysis, we contribute the successful outcome to a combination of ultrasound-guided therapy, capnography-guided CPR, and “crew resource management” principles. Our case illustrates that a pulmonary artery catheter can be used successfully in a non-tertiary setting, to perform a percutaneous procedure during CPR and that full neurological recovery is possible after 90 minutes of CPR.