When infants with severe cardiac or respiratory conditions require extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO), they face a serious risk of fluid overload and kidney injury.

Intensivist Brian Bridges, M.D., medical director of ECMO at Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt, and collaborators across North America have been studying ECMO outcomes and have identified a critical role for early fluid management and continuous renal replacement therapy..

"In patients with acute kidney injury and severe fluid overload on ECMO, if we start kidney support therapy before their fluid overload gets too severe, the patient is more likely to survive the hospital discharge," Bridges said.

A team of critical care specialists and pediatric nephrologists working together have been key to finding answers to this and other life-saving questions, Bridges said.