Emergency Transfer Center

These highly trained roles are essential to the success of our Emergency Transfer Center.

Air Care Dispatch

• Facilitates an average of 200 flights per month, making our flight program one of the busiest in the nation
• Optimizes our response, with the help of sophisticated Computer Aided Dispatch
• Assigns the appropriate responders, quickly and efficiently
• Precisely creates, documents and communicates flight plans, collaborating with responders, local 911 centers, counties and transfer center

Ground Dispatch

• Facilitates a program with an average of more than 240 transports per month
• Dispatch and communicate with our ground teams
• Communicates with Orlando Health centers, hospitals and free-standing emergency departments to facilitate interfacility transport
• Supports interfacility ground volume
• Provide estimated time of arrival data to customers, facilitating smooth operations

Transfer Center

• Handles over 20,000 calls monthly
• Collaborate with all internal and external customers
• Facilitate transfer and transport of patients into the Orlando Health system
• Handles all levels of priority for transfers
• Work with physicians for transfers and admissions to the right facilities, for the right reasons at the right time
• Orlando Health nurses are an integral part of the department, which expands our ability to support clinical needs during transfer

Communications Center

To ensure quality care and safe transport for the critically ill, the Orlando Health Air Care Communications Team continuously monitors all transit from our partner hospitals' rooftops and ground helipad cameras. A large, digital map shows the real-time location of our own ground and air vehicles as well as all critical care transport units throughout Central Florida. For safety, we track all weather information in real time and provide accurate time of arrival information for each transport.

The highly trained 10-person Communications Team works to manage the logistics for each patient and transport to:

• Determine the most appropriate mode of critical care transport to be deployed for each patient
• Mobilize the critical care transport teams
• Coordinate with first responders (EMS personnel) in the case of helicopter scene calls, identifying the nearest and safest landing zone
• Determine which hospital to direct each patient to, depending on need, coordinating with hospital teams and security departments
• Monitor changing weather conditions to keep pilots updated for safety