Ornge opens new local facility

Shawn Patterson remembers the day when he almost lost his daughter.

It was about three years ago, when the then three-year-old Anna became seriously ill. Patterson said his daughter looked fine on the outside but that wasn’t the case.

Anna went to the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre to receive treatment. After doctors examined Anna, they made the decision to transfer her to the children’s hospital in Winnipeg.

Ornge paramedics flew Anna to Winnipeg where she and her family spent 54 days before she went to Toronto for liver surgery. Patterson said her portal vein on the outside of her liver was blocked and most likely blocked since birth. Over time the blockage built up and eventually erupted causing massive bleeding, he said.

"Outwardly she looked 100 per cent fine," Patterson said. "But she had this situation burying inside of her probably for years. She is now six years old and in Grade 1 at Agnew Johnston School and she’s a thousand miles an hour and feeling quite healthy."

Anna often travels to Toronto for check ups and doctors still don’t know what caused the root problem in the first place, he said.

But Patterson said that without the services of Ornge, his daughter’s outcome would have been different.

Patterson, Anna and the rest of the family attended the Ornge Trasport Medicine Centre of Excellence Northwestern Ontario opening on Saturday. The more than 27,000 square foot facility holds three airplanes, a helicopter and land ambulance. The facility, on Derek Burney Drive, includes a simulation training room and a medically equipped patient waiting area.

Rick Potter, chief operation officer with Ornge Aviation, said with the new facility it means there is more potential to assist those in Thunder Bay and the regions that aren’t accessible or have access to medical services.

"We can be anywhere in northwestern Ontario; worst case scenario two hours, most communities less than an hour," Potter said. "Working with the Thunder Bay International Airport is a tremendous advantage. There is an air traffic controller here, which helps expedite our arrivals and departures and it’s really a win-win situation."