Sunday, April 22, 2007
You're trapped in a car that has been smashed to hell - the entire front end has been torn and crushed. You have, too.
It's rush hour in the fourth largest city in the country. Gridlock on the freeways. On a good day, in normal traffic, you're 30 minutes away from the nearest level one trauma center. Once you get cut out of your car. At 6 p.m. on a Monday it will take more than an hour to get your there by land. There is a local hospital about ten minutes from where you are, but if you are taken there you might not live. They aren't equipped or trained to help people who are hurt as badly as you are.
The Memorial Hermann Life Flight helicopter is called for while you're still trapped.
Finally, as you're strapped in for your first helicopter ride you are broken and bleeding, you are unconscious, you are helpless. Thanks to the Life Flight helicopter, twenty minutes after you are cut out of your car, you are in the Memorial Hermann Emergency Department being cared for by some of the most dedicated, talented, and experienced emergency medicine health care professionals in the world. They are your best chance at life. And you don't even know any of this is happening.
You owe your life, in truth, to James Henry Duke, Jr., Md. Dr. Red Duke. He is a legend in Houston. Without him, there would be no Life Flight helicopter to swoop out of the sky staffed with experts in their field to whisk you away to Hermann, to save your life.
The four helicopters that currently fly for Memorial Hermann are, on average, about 17 years old. They have thousands of flight hours. They have no GPS, no ability to download vital information to the emergency room that is your destination. Not a single one was designed to address the special needs of patients who are children. How many people do you know who drive a CAR that is seventeen years old?
The city of Houston encompasses more than 500 square miles. Life Flight services a 150 mile radius from Houston. They go all the way down to Victoria, over to Lake Charles in Louisiana, down to Galveston and up to Brenham. Just last weekend on the way home from Austin I witnessed a horrible accident on Highway 290 at 36 in Brenham that involved four people. One died. The other three were flown to Houston on Life Flight helicopters and they lived.
These helicopters fly more than 3,000 missions a year and are in such heavy demand that, on average, they must turn down over 100 requests for help because there just aren't enough helicopters and staff to respond to all the people in need. What if you are that person who doesn't get helped, who doesn't live because there just isn't help available. What if you are that person's husband? What if you are that person's mother? One quarter of all Life Flight patients are children.
The dream is six new helicopters and support facilities. The helicopters will cost $36 million dollars. It will cost an additional $1 million to build a new central dispatch and operations center, and to add a new operations base for the east side of town which doesn't have one right now. Another $3 million is needed to train staff, upgrade technology systems, and provide community education and outreach. Currently, more than $20 million has been raised toward a goal of $40 million.
You can't even imagine ever needing a Life Flight helicopter. Neither did I. You don't have to be rich to support this fundraising program. You just have to care. As you can see, I do.
It's rush hour in the fourth largest city in the country. Gridlock on the freeways. On a good day, in normal traffic, you're 30 minutes away from the nearest level one trauma center. Once you get cut out of your car. At 6 p.m. on a Monday it will take more than an hour to get your there by land. There is a local hospital about ten minutes from where you are, but if you are taken there you might not live. They aren't equipped or trained to help people who are hurt as badly as you are.
The Memorial Hermann Life Flight helicopter is called for while you're still trapped.
Finally, as you're strapped in for your first helicopter ride you are broken and bleeding, you are unconscious, you are helpless. Thanks to the Life Flight helicopter, twenty minutes after you are cut out of your car, you are in the Memorial Hermann Emergency Department being cared for by some of the most dedicated, talented, and experienced emergency medicine health care professionals in the world. They are your best chance at life. And you don't even know any of this is happening.
You owe your life, in truth, to James Henry Duke, Jr., Md. Dr. Red Duke. He is a legend in Houston. Without him, there would be no Life Flight helicopter to swoop out of the sky staffed with experts in their field to whisk you away to Hermann, to save your life.
The four helicopters that currently fly for Memorial Hermann are, on average, about 17 years old. They have thousands of flight hours. They have no GPS, no ability to download vital information to the emergency room that is your destination. Not a single one was designed to address the special needs of patients who are children. How many people do you know who drive a CAR that is seventeen years old?
The city of Houston encompasses more than 500 square miles. Life Flight services a 150 mile radius from Houston. They go all the way down to Victoria, over to Lake Charles in Louisiana, down to Galveston and up to Brenham. Just last weekend on the way home from Austin I witnessed a horrible accident on Highway 290 at 36 in Brenham that involved four people. One died. The other three were flown to Houston on Life Flight helicopters and they lived.
These helicopters fly more than 3,000 missions a year and are in such heavy demand that, on average, they must turn down over 100 requests for help because there just aren't enough helicopters and staff to respond to all the people in need. What if you are that person who doesn't get helped, who doesn't live because there just isn't help available. What if you are that person's husband? What if you are that person's mother? One quarter of all Life Flight patients are children.
The dream is six new helicopters and support facilities. The helicopters will cost $36 million dollars. It will cost an additional $1 million to build a new central dispatch and operations center, and to add a new operations base for the east side of town which doesn't have one right now. Another $3 million is needed to train staff, upgrade technology systems, and provide community education and outreach. Currently, more than $20 million has been raised toward a goal of $40 million.
You can't even imagine ever needing a Life Flight helicopter. Neither did I. You don't have to be rich to support this fundraising program. You just have to care. As you can see, I do.
Labels: accident, headlines, medicine, miata
# posted by Carol : 3:10 PM
