ORLANDO, Fla. \u2014 Dr. Chadwick Smith, the trauma surgeon on call at Orlando Regional Medical Center on the night of the Pulse nightclub shooting, said training was key in the hospital\u2019s response as dozens of patients arrived in the emergency room in a matter of minutes.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe first wave of patients was 36 patients in 36 minutes \u2014 about a patient a minute for about a half hour,\u201d Smith said. <\/p>\n
As the on-call trauma surgeon, Smith was responsible for coordinating emergency care for patients arriving at the hospital when the Pulse shooting happened. He said the scale of the response was unlike anything he had experienced.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou rely on your training and do what you gotta do,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
Smith said that preparation was essential during the response.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a reason we train for all of these things to make us ready \u2014 you\u2019re not going to be ready if you haven\u2019t practiced for thousands and thousands and thousands of hours doing what we do,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Smith said training that can feel routine took on added importance after Pulse.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we do all this training and you haven\u2019t gone through something like this, you think, \u2018Oh gosh, we\u2019re going through another training session,\u2019\u201d Smith said. \u201cBut after going through training and having gone through that event, and then going through the training again \u2014 it\u2019s not exactly the same, but it does mimic the feeling of the level of acuity with that many patients coming through at one time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith said the shooting prompted changes at ORMC, including the installation of metal detectors at all main entrances. And Orlando Health officials said there are more security staff throughout the hospital campus, and Pulse reiterated the importance of constantly maintaining strong relationships with local law enforcement agencies.<\/p>\n
Orlando Health\u2019s emergency department also received a major upgrade last year. Smith said the improvements were designed using feedback from doctors and nurses who responded to Pulse.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt changed our organization,\u201d Smith said. \u201cWe have a more robust training system than we did \u2014 it\u2019s just that much more important.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith said every patient who came through ORMC\u2019s emergency room that night survived. He said he still hears updates about some of the survivors.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery now and then I hear something about them and that they\u2019re doing well, and that\u2019s a good feeling to know they\u2019re doing well,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
In the 10 years since the Pulse shooting, Smith said he and others with Orlando Health have given hundreds of talks to healthcare, disaster and law enforcement organizations across the country and around the world. He said their main message is to be prepared for what could potentially happen in their cities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORLANDO, Fla. \u2014 Dr. Chadwick Smith, the trauma surgeon on call at Orlando Regional Medical Center on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":303927,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3948,274,28,571,12716,115,1335,139,141,140,16956,135,278,835],"class_list":["post-303926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-app-health","tag-app-top-stories","tag-florida","tag-health","tag-jeff-allen","tag-news","tag-orange-county","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-pulse-shooting","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303926\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/303927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}