Children's Hospital of Dallas Receives Aviation Award

In recognition of its rapid response to a serious traffic accident that helped save the lives of several children, the Neonatal/Pediatric Transport Team at Children’s Health of Dallas is the 2022 recipient of the Helicopter Association International (HAI) Salute to Excellence Golden Hour Award. Children’s Health, one of the nation’s largest pediatric health systems, transported more than 5,000 patients in 2021.

On Aug. 10, 2021, the unit responded to an accident 65 miles northeast of Dallas that involved a tractor-trailer and a vehicle carrying two adults and five unrestrained children. That vehicle rolled during the crash, severely injuring everyone on board.

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As the local community hospital wasn't equipped to handle such a large patient load, including children, its emergency room staff contacted Children’s Health to request support.

At the hospital’s airbase in Dallas, preparations immediately began to transport the juvenile patients to Children’s Health, a level-one trauma center. The center dispatched an ambulance and a team of pediatric medical specialists and reconfigured its Sikorsky S-76C++ aeromedical helicopter to transport two patients.

When the ambulance team reached the accident location, they quickly stabilized and triaged the children, determining that the two who had suffered the most critical injuries would require helicopter transport. The S-76 arrived within 20 minutes of the ambulance and those two children were loaded on board. The ambulance delivered a third child to Dallas and local EMS services carried the remaining two. All five made full recoveries.