The medical professionals and staff at the Level One Trauma Center played a crucial role as they cared for 44 of the victims injured during the Pulse shooting.

Through a collaboration with The Bogdahn Group and Orlando Health, Elevation has made a commitment to support the Level One Trauma Center at Orlando Regional Medical Center.

The Orlando Health Level One Trauma Center is the only one in the region and is unique because it is funded primarily through philanthropic gifts. Every day these gifts prove to be invaluable as lives are saved. The medical professionals and staff at the Level One Trauma Center played a crucial role as they cared for 44 of the victims injured during the Pulse shooting. Therefore, through their generous giving, many donors also helped to save the lives of these victims.

Elevation has committed to a gift of $25,000. We invite you to participate with us and make an impact by supporting the Orlando Health Level One Trauma Center.

A generous foundation located in California has generously agreed to match all donations up to $250,000. This means that the gift that you are providing today will be matched dollar-for-dollar.

We understand that there are many different opportunities to give and participate in the healing of the victims of the Orlando community and we are thankful for your support.

Please send all gifts by July 31, 2016 and make payable to:
Orlando Health Foundation
Please send them to:
Elevation Financial Group
507 N. New York Avenue
Suite 300
Winter Park, FL 32789
ATTN: Denise Cipriano

For questions, please Denise Cipriano at DCipriano@ElevationFinancialGroup.com or at 407-215-1350 or Scott Lee at SLee@ElevationFinancialGroup.com.

Why the Level One Trauma Center?

It was this trauma center to which many of the casualties suffered in Sunday’s horrific tragedy were brought. The medical professionals staffing this center are the ones you have seen sharing the heroic stories of that day. Things have been said like:

• "The entire team came together. Everyone knew that they had to bring their 'A' game." Dr. Michael Cheatham, Chief Surgical Quality Officer, ORMC Level One Trauma Center.
• “I will love you guys, forever.” Angel Colon, Pulse Nightclub shooting survivor to the team at the ORMC Level One Trauma Center.

For more than 20 years, Orlando Health Foundation has proudly raised financial support and awareness for the Level One Trauma Center at ORMC. Philanthropic gifts help support the unique needs of the region’s only Level One Trauma Center to ensure our physicians, clinical staff, operating rooms and other resources are ready and waiting when it matters most. Many generous donors helped save lives this weekend – and will continue helping save lives in the days to come.

Over the past 10 years, we raised $2.2 million in net proceeds from our “ONE NIGHT to Celebrate Excellence in Trauma Care” event alone. Gifts outside the event raised even more support for the region’s Trauma Center.

Most trauma patients at ORMC are from car crashes and falls, though our team trains for and is prepared for any situation. While we never imagined such a horrible act, philanthropic support for the Level One Trauma Center helped provide the facilities, technologies, training and readiness needed to save lives.

What is a Trauma Center?
Not all hospitals are trauma centers, and not every emergency department can handle every emergency. A trauma center is a state-accredited program that offers the highest level of expertise and care in the shortest possible time.

Due to the intense demands and unpredictable nature of trauma care, and being Central Florida’s ONLY Level One Trauma Center, every need must be anticipated every second of every day.

A trauma center is required to have emergency medicine physicians, trauma surgeons, nurses and other medical professionals in-house 24 hours a day, seven days a week.Teams of 15 to 20 medical professionals stand ready and waiting to begin immediate lifesaving care as soon as a trauma patient arrives. In addition, a dedicated operating room is always ready, and a host of subspecialists are immediately available. Seriously injured patients who receive definitive care within the first hour after a traumatic injury have a 15 – 30 percent higher chance of survival, thus it is commonly called “The Golden Hour.” Some experts say trauma centers can also improve quality of life by as much as 85 percent. This level of “readiness” defines trauma care ― and often makes the difference between life and death. Though costly, it saves lives.

Orlando Health does not receive substantial local public funding to support operating a Level One Trauma Center as many centers do throughout the state of Florida. It is a service that Orlando Health as a mission-driven, not-for-profit healthcare organization has chosen to provide because of its commitment to the community and the critical need for trauma care.

Philanthropic support is essential.

Examples of Philanthropy in Action:
In addition to the “readiness*” cost of trauma, philanthropy helps support the facilities and technologies needed to ensure that our Trauma Center is ready and waiting to save lives.

As part of the construction at ORMC, we expanded our Trauma capacity, including:

• Renovation of the Trauma Bays to make equipment and supplies more readily accessible. Beyond the Trauma Bays, additional space was reconfigured to expand our capacity to care for patients in need of complex orthopedic care and/or resuscitation.
• We added a new lobby and waiting room for our Trauma Center and Emergency Department at ORMC. We are also increasing our total emergency beds from 54 to 72 (construction will be completed by Fall 2016).
• Surgical intervention is at the heart of Trauma Care. Last year, we added 10 new Operating Rooms.
• In April 2016, we opened an expanded Surgical Waiting Room for family and friends of patients undergoing surgery.
• We opened a new 16-bed Trauma ICU and a new Trauma Step-Down unit. We built these 2 units in coordination with our Neuro ICU and Neuro Step Down units, so that patients could easily overflow between the units in times of need.
• Our new 53 bed rehab unit allows ORMC to offer a full spectrum of care, from immediate intervention in the Trauma Bay to surgery, recovery and rehabilitation. Our goal is to get trauma patients back to what they were doing before the trauma occurred. This unit opened in May 2015.

Philanthropy helped support this construction, as well as life-saving technology to care for trauma patients, including:

• An ultra-fast, low dose CT scan adjacent to the Trauma Bay, which allows the Trauma Team to scan patients literally from head to toe in a matter of seconds to quickly access injuries and determine the plan for treatment. This technology, which cost more than $3m, was funded entirely by philanthropy.
• Other devices including video laryngoscopes (especially helpful to secure airways for severely injured and bloody patients), a portable C-Arm (lose-dose X-ray used to help remove debris in trauma patients and to ensure proper alignment of bones when resetting breaks and fractures), and point-of-care ultrasound machines (which can help detect internal bleeding in seconds) are all critical tools used by the trauma team in the Trauma Bay. With a cost of $15,000 to $100,000, each of these devices were made possible generous philanthropic donors.

* It cost Orlando Health approximately $18 million annually just to be “ready” for trauma patients. This includes having teams of physicians and nurses in-house and immediately available, as well an operating room that is always staffed and ready to care for trauma patients. This “readiness” cost does not include costs related to treating any patients.