COVID-19 Survivor Returns to Meet Hospital Staff That Saved Her Life

Ocoee, FL (October 12, 2021) – Today physicians and team members at Orlando Health – Health Central Hospital staged an intimate reunion ceremony for a COVID-19 survivor who spent 40 days in the hospital’s critical care unit. Maureen Woods, 56, returned to the very same patient room to thank the joyous team of healthcare workers who played such vital roles in saving her life.

On July 24^th, Woods was admitted to the hospital for painful kidney stones when she tested positive for COVID-19.  Her condition rapidly declined. She developed pneumonia, a blood infection, a collapsed lower lung, and her body went into total organ failure as she lapsed into a coma for nearly three weeks.

Due to being critically ill throughout much of her hospital stay, she feels she never got a chance to properly know the team who took care of both her and her husband throughout her medical crisis. “I don’t remember them, so I can’t wait to meet them,” said Woods, whose husband told her of the conversation with Joel Santora, MD, who promised to do all that he could to give her the best chance of recovering. “I wanted to meet the man who saved my life.”

“It’s an awesome feeling to not only see, but to talk to Maureen and see the progress she’s made since she was a patient on our unit,” said Dr. Joel Santora, medical director of Critical Care Medicine, Orlando Health – Health Central Hospital. “Most times after patients are discharged, our team doesn’t receive any further updates on their condition or how they’re recovering. For her to come back to visit us and say thank you means the world to our team.”

After 40 days at Orlando Health – Health Central, Woods was transferred to an Orlando Health inpatient rehab unit before being discharged to return home on September 14^th, spending 52 days as a hospital patient.

 

About Orlando Health

Orlando Health, headquartered in Orlando, Florida, is a private, not-for-profit healthcare organization with $7.6 billion of assets under management that serves the southeastern United States.

Founded more than 100 years ago, the healthcare system is recognized around the world for its pediatric and adult Level One Trauma program as well as the only state-accredited Level Two Adult Trauma Center in the St. Petersburg region. It is the home of the nation’s largest neonatal intensive care unit under one roof, the only system in the southeast to offer open fetal surgery to repair the most severe forms of spina bifida, the site of an Olympic athlete training facility and operator of one of the largest and highest performing clinically integrated networks in the region. Orlando Health is a statutory teaching system that pioneers life-changing medical research. The 3,200-bed system includes 15 wholly-owned hospitals and emergency departments; rehabilitation services, cancer and heart institutes, imaging and laboratory services, wound care centers, physician offices for adults and pediatrics, skilled nursing facilities, an in-patient behavioral health facility, home healthcare services in partnership with LHC Group, and urgent care centers in partnership with CareSpot Urgent Care. Nearly 4,200 physicians, representing more than 80 medical specialties and subspecialties have privileges across the Orlando Health system, which employs nearly 22,000 team members. In FY20, Orlando Health served nearly 150,000 inpatients and nearly 3.1 million outpatients. During that same time period, Orlando Health provided approximately $760 million in total value to the communities it serves in the form of charity care, community benefit programs and services, community building activities and more. Additional information can be found at http://www.orlandohealth.com, or follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @orlandohealth.