When it comes to trauma and emergency care, every moment counts.

That’s why, at Lahey Hospital & Medical Center, we prioritized opening a new, on-site helideck that can transport patients to the Joseph C. Corkery, MD, Emergency Center within one minute of its landing. Since it was cleared for landing in October 2021, the helideck has helped numerous patients receive lifesaving care more rapidly than ever before. Just on its first day of operation, eight separate flights transported patients into care.

“The impact of the new helideck has been significant,” says Malcolm Creighton, MD, Chair of Emergency Medicine at Lahey. “Since it has been in use, the time from ‘scene to trauma room’ has been reduced by at least 12 minutes—and in trauma care, every minute is vitally important.”

Prior to the new helideck’s opening, patients landed a short distance from the hospital and were transported by ambulance to the emergency department. In order to cut out unnecessary travel, our new helideck is located on-site and allows patients to arrive in the Corkery Emergency Center efficiently and in record time.

As a Level I Trauma Center—the only Massachusetts facility north of Boston with this accreditation—Lahey treats more than 45,000 patients per year, many of whom are rushed to Lahey suffering from neurovascular emergencies, including stroke. In addition, trauma specialists at Lahey are experts in treating patients injured in motor vehicle and boating accidents, patients with traumatic brain injuries, or those who have had serious falls.

“Along with providing faster access to emergency care, the new helideck has facilitated transfers from smaller community hospitals to our tertiary care ICUs, which was especially important during the recent COVID surge,” says Creighton.

We know that none of this could have been possible without the support of our remarkable donors. Their ongoing generosity has directly provided for the construction and operation of this helideck—and is already making a tremendous impact. “For Marilyn and me, the decision to support this work was an easy one,” says Charles Stuckey, who along with his wife, made a generous commitment to the helideck. “LHMC is our family’s hospital and our community’s hospital, and we wanted to help ensure that more people would not only have access to the extraordinary trauma care provided here—but also to ensure they could receive the most timely care possible.”

Joseph Corkery, MD, Chief Medical Officer for Philanthropy at Lahey, has been an immense advocate for the helideck. Since the project’s inception, he has ardently encouraged friends of the hospital to support this effort. As the capstone of the hospital’s Corkery Emergency Center renovation, the helideck was the final element necessary to provide truly seamless, state-of-the-art emergency care at Lahey.

Longtime Lahey supporters Tim and Molly Neher, both grateful patients of Corkery, were impressed with the emergency center’s progress and made a generous gift to the helideck fund. “Molly and I are so grateful for all that Lahey and Dr. Joseph Corkery have done for the Neher family and so many others,” says Tim. “We welcomed the opportunity to further honor him with a gift to the new helideck, which undoubtedly will enhance the lifesaving work already being done in the new Corkery Emergency Center.” In addition, we are incredibly grateful to many of our longstanding donors who selflessly gave to this initiative, including the Anthony and Gladys Sakowich Charitable Foundation, Digital Federal Credit Union, Julie and Jeffrey Parker, Gail and James Radley, and Summit Packaging Systems.

We are grateful for the numerous ways our new helideck—supported by the philanthropy of many—continues to support patients during their most traumatic moments by expediting care, ultimately saving lives.

Make a gift to LHMC today.