Paediatric perfusion

Pay in the destination countries

Monthly, in US dollars. Each country is an Imora admission package — open one for that route's fees, language requirement and deadline.

What does the day look like?

You assemble the heart-lung console for congenital heart surgery, prime the circuit with blood products and crystalloids, run safety checks, manage heparin and activated clotting time, start and conduct bypass, deliver cardioplegia, manage blood gases and electrolytes, run ultrafiltration and temperature management, wean from bypass and hand over to intensive care. On ECMO you start support, monitor the circuit, change circuits and help with decannulation. Named systems are LivaNova, Medtronic and Getinge consoles, membrane oxygenators, neonatal and pediatric cannulae, activated clotting time analysers, point-of-care blood gas analysers, cerebral and somatic oximetry and blood management devices. You chart in the hospital electronic record and the perfusion record, plus the ELSO Registry where the centre takes part.

Hands-on bypass in surgery is a minority share of clock time. Most time goes to preparation, checks, standby, charting, blood product coordination, equipment maintenance, teaching, audit and on-call cover. Pediatric heart centres and ECMO centres provide continuous cover on full time posts with on-call rotas and urgent recall, with nights, recalls and long bedside runs in neonatal ECMO.

Where does this lead?