Twenty years ago, the Health Care District of Palm Beach County, a public safety-net healthcare organization, established the county’s life-saving Trauma System. The Trauma System took flight in 1991 after the Health Care District’s Board approved the purchase of a Trauma Hawk helicopter to airlift critically-injured patients to two local Trauma Centers. The first trauma patients received care in May of 1991. Since then the Trauma System, which is overseen and funded by the Health Care District, has treated 50,000 traumatically-injured patients.
“Thanks to the skill and dedication of the professionals who support the Trauma System in Palm Beach County, tens of thousands of trauma victims have survived,” said Jonathan R. Satter, Chair of the Health Care District’s Board of Commissioners. “This milestone is the result of a successful private and governmental partnership.”
Based on a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ report, Palm Beach County’s Trauma System meets the guidelines of a national model because it encompasses all of the recommended components for an inclusive Trauma System. The Trauma System in Palm Beach County is also a pioneer in that its Implementation Plan was the first of its kind approved by the State of Florida.
This coordinated emergency-response system includes: employees with the District’s Aeromedical Program, which features two Trauma Hawk air ambulances; the county’s enhanced 911 communications and dispatch system; the county’s EMS providers, who support the Trauma System’s pre-hospital component; the trauma physicians, nurses and staff at the county’s two privately-operated Trauma Centers and their rehabilitation facilities; and staff with the District’s Trauma Agency, who oversee a system-wide quality management program.
Through its Aeromedical Program, the District owns and operates two Sikorsky S76-C+ Trauma Hawk air ambulances, which are dispatched when travel time for ground transportation exceeds 20 minutes. The highly-skilled and experienced flight crew includes commercial instrument-rated pilots, a Florida-licensed registered nurse who is also a state-certified paramedic, and an additional state-certified paramedic. The medical team members are Palm Beach County Fire Rescue personnel.
