Orlando Health Hosts Alzheimer’s Walk For Residents & Family

Ocoee, FL (October 19, 2021) – In the lead up to Alzheimer’s Awareness Month, the Orlando Health Center for Rehabilitation held its second annual “Walk Before the Walk” event this morning on its campus in Ocoee.

Residents of the facility’s memory care unit joined loved ones, team members and community supporters as they walked and wheeled around the planned parade route just outside the facility’s front door. The nearly 70 participants wore t-shirts bearing the purple ribbon symbolizing Alzheimer’s awareness and carried purple pinwheels bearing the names of loved ones suffering from the disease.

“It's our second year staging this event. This is our way of kicking off a month of raising awareness for this horrible disease and generating excitement for the Alzheimer’s Association Walk to End Alzheimer’s happening this weekend at Lake Eola in downtown Orlando,” said Judy Skilton, program coordinator, Orlando Health Center for Rehabilitation. “Hosting a smaller walk on our campus provides our residents, many with mobility issues, and their loved ones the opportunity to participate together in promoting this cause without having to travel.”

In the United States alone, more than six million people are living with Alzheimer’s, a disease that kills more than breast cancer and prostate cancer combined.

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.