Update: Impact to Golisano Children’s Hospital of Southwest Florida from Hurricane Ian
This past month has been devastating for many across the Southeast, and particularly our friends and colleagues in the Fort Myers-Naples community. As you have seen in the news and also seen on our CMN Hospitals social channels, Hurricane Ian took its toll on not only the community, but also our member hospital–Golisano Children’s Hospital of Southwest Florida. “There is so much loss and devastation it’s truly beyond words. “The images you are seeing on the news are real and so much worse,” is what we initially heard from our colleagues in Southwest Florida.
The hospital experienced significant flooding on the first floors of the building and within the parking lot outside Golisano and Health Park, impacting a significant number of healthcare workers that lost their vehicles while working through the storm. Following the storm, the hospital experienced a water main line break that forced the hospital to evacuate patients to neighboring Children’s Hospitals – a number of patients were transported to fellow CMN member hospitals in Miami and Orlando. While power, cell service, and running water have been restored to this community, the needs are mounting daily.
CMN Hospitals rallied quickly to get a donation site live to accept donations for critical needs that we can supply monetary funding for. Meanwhile, many of you have also reached out to show your concern and find out how you can support as well. There is a long road ahead for restoring this community, but the hospital is actively deploying these two areas to support their patients and staff as best they can:
Transportation
One of the greatest impacts of Hurricane Ian to patients and staff at Golisano Children’s Hospital was loss of transportation – many lost their vehicles to flooding in surrounding parking lots. This overwhelming loss of transportation has become the most significant need at this point – the hospital is working tirelessly to provide transportation for patients to get to surrounding hospitals, maintain daily outpatient appointments, and transport critical staff. Funding for transportation needs will go to provide gas cards, uber and lyft rides, rental services, and various other transportation needs.
Housing
Safe and clean conditions extend beyond the hospital as well – families that have lost their homes but are needing unique living accommodations to care for their sick children are being provided safe and clean accommodations by the hospital where accessible. Caring for staff and patients that lost everything in their homes is a big area of need for this community – from providing accessible housing for critical staff to resupplying needed medications for patients, the hospital is trying to meet the needs of the community in every way they can.
Through this storm, our colleagues in Southwest Florida have felt the power of this network to leverage partner support and rally alongside them through these unfortunate circumstances. We will be fortunate to see members of the Golisano team at Fall Business Meetings in Salt Lake City and know they are eager to thank so many of you who have reached out and sent your support.
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On behalf of all of us at Golisano Children’s Hospital of Southwest Florida, I want to thank our colleagues from across the nation that have offered support to us after this tragedy. The loss here to our communities has been tremendous. While our relatively new hospital held up remarkably well, we were forced to evacuate due to the loss of water pressure, which required the shutdown of our fire safety system. We are grateful to the hospitals from across the state that took in our 80 kiddos, most of whom have been returned to our care already.
The greater challenge we have right now is supporting our healthcare heroes, especially those that worked through the storm yet lost their cars and homes due to the storm surge. All of our team is accounted for, and we remain blessed in so many ways, but it will take years for our staff, patients and community to recover.
If anyone has any further questions, please call me at 216-337-2197 and thank you again!