Martha Lillard, the last known American to use an iron lung, died in Shawnee on June 26 at age 78.
Lillard contracted polio as a 5-year-old in 1953, around the height of the virus' spread in the United States. Doctors at the time frequently used iron lungs to help victims survive the disease, which could paralyze their muscles and deplete their lung capacity.
With the advent of more modern ventilators, iron lungs have become virtually obsolete. Lillard, though, refused to switch to a different respiration system, insisting that the iron lung was the most comfortable option for her.
"So I just wanted people to understand that it's not, 'Oh, I want to be in the iron lung.' That's not true," Lillard said in a 2021 episode of Radio Diaries. "I would rather not need it at all. But sometimes when I get in there, I say, 'Thank you.' It feels wonderful to get into it. It's the thing that's been there that saved my life and I know that it's the only thing that's kept me here."
To use an iron lung, patients lay inside the large metal chamber equipped with bellows that pump air in and out. The machine uses a process called External Negative Pressure Ventilation to force steady breathing.
Since developing polio, Lillard slept each night in her iron lung. As a child, she lay in the chamber nearly full-time and attended school for only one hour per day, she said in the Radio Diaries episode. As she got healthier, Lillard only relied on the iron lung while she slept at night, KFOR reported.
Dependence on the iron lung posed challenges for Lillard. The machine began to break down in the 1990s, Lillard said in the Radio Diaries episode, and she sought a replacement. She also recalled an ice storm that cut electricity to her home. The generator she normally used to power her iron lung in emergencies had died, and she called 911 for help.
Lillard died following a battle with long-haul COVID-19, according to her obituary. Toward the end of her life, she slept in the iron lung for nearly the entire day, KFOR reported.
Lillard was an active community member, volunteering at the Pottawatomie County Humane Society, a local daycare center and a crisis phone line in Shawnee, according to her obituary. A GoFundMe seeking support for Lillard's probate and funeral expenses described her as creative. She painted, wrote poetry and composed music for the left hand piano.
She is survived by her husband, her sister and brother-in-law and several cousins, nieces and nephews.
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