The ECMO life support system is expensive and not widely available. "It was a great relief to us upon hearing that one such machine was available within the prefecture," he said.

A meticulously planned operation then swung into action about a week after the patient was admitted into the Wenshan prefecture hospital. The night before, an additional anesthesiology expert was dispatched from Shanghai to the hospital and an ECMO machine was placed on standby.

The surgery lasted eight hours and was carried out via the joint efforts of local medical staff and the Shanghai physicians. The critical intubation proceeded smoothly, and overall bleeding was minimal.

"Zha appeared well the next morning, with his blood oxygen level reaching a normal 100 percent. Before the surgery, it was below the critical 95 percent threshold even when he was wearing a respirator," Xu said, adding that Zha is expected to be discharged in two weeks.

"Leveraging insights from this case, we plan to further investigate the underlying cause of the condition," he added.

Zhou Xingtao, president of the hospital, said: "Throughout the treatment of the patient, we had implemented advanced difficult airway management protocols, a multidisciplinary team diagnosis and treatment model and a comprehensive healthcare management chain locally. This has demonstrated the capability and technical expertise of the national-level team.

"The case has also established a diagnosis and treatment model that has the potential to be replicated to handle such complicated diseases in the region," he added.

According to the hospital, the team sent to Wenshan consisted of 35 experts, specializing in eye, ear, nose and throat, dental medicine, related plastic surgery, radiation oncology, nursing and health education.