The Victoria Police Blue Ribbon Foundation Peninsula branch engages with communities from Frankston and along the Mornington Peninsula to remember members of Victoria Police who died in the line of duty. The focus of their work is to raise money to install living memorials in both the Frankston & Rosebud hospitals. All Projects funded by the branch are be named in memory of fallen officers. To date the Peninsula Branch has raised over $500,000 to support the Frankston & Rosebud hospitals.

The branch has now committed to raise $265,000 for two Heart Lung (ECMO) units for the Frankston hospital to provide life saving care for the Peninsula communities.

Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation or more commonly known as ECMO is equipment used to support heart and lung function for prolonged periods of time (up to several weeks) in intensive care units. The equipment is similar but more sophisticated than the heart lung bypass machine used during cardiac surgery.

It is used in patients with very severe heart and lung failure to support the functions of the heart or lung when other treatments could help the heart and lungs to recover. A common example is patients with severe pneumonia where the native lung function cannot help patients receive the oxygen they need. While antibiotics can work and treat pneumonia, the patients still need oxygen to live during the time when their lungs are recovering. Oxygen delivered by other equipment available in hospitals may not be adequate in such patients. Without oxygen that the lungs provide to the patients, the patients will die. Using ECMO in such situations will deliver adequate oxygen to the patients (not dependent on the patients lungs) while the lungs recover from pneumonia. A similar situation can arise when heart failure occurs suddenly, for example after a bad heart attack. Patients in such situations need ECMO urgently while the heart problem can be treated.

Currently Frankston Hospital receives around 10 patients per year who would benefit from ECMO. However, if we had this equipment these numbers would significantly increase because patients who are critically ill would not need to be transferred to the Alfred, currently the closest hospital with the ECMO machine. Patients could be treated locally in their own community