When Seconds Count

Today’s emergency rooms are prepared for the worst with advanced technology, procedures and training.

- Susan Jenks

Most of the 75 beds in the emergency room at Orlando Regional Medical Center filled up quickly during the one man terrorist attack at the Pulse nightclub on June 12th. Normally, those beds serve patients with vastly different injuries from simple bone breaks to far more severe compound fractures, as well as life-threatening heart attacks and strokes.

But, on that morning, everything normal was off the table, says Dr. David Cassidy, the assistant director/quality officer in the department of emergency medicine at ORMC, where first responders took almost all of the gunshot victims after the shooting rampage by Omar Mateen.

Although hospital staff is trained to be prepared for anything, Cassidy says, “Who would have thought there would be an attack one block away from our hospital?”

In terms of survival, the Orlando hospital’s proximity to the unfolding tragedy certainly played a role for many of those sustaining the worst injuries. But ORMC’s status in Florida as one of just 10 Level 1 trauma centers, where highly trained trauma teams provide round-the-clock medical care, also worked in victims’ favor.

So, too, did advances in emergency medicine over the past 15 years since the 9/11 terror attacks, from pre-training simulation drills in preparation for mass casualty events to technological advances that mean more accurate diagnoses and a better chance of saving those at life’s fragile edges.