The Division of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery of the George Washington University is the academic arm of the Center for Trauma and Critical Care (CTACC) of the George Washington University Hospital and Virginia Hospital Center. The Division’s mission is to deliver complete Acute Care Surgery – defined as trauma, emergency general surgery, and surgical critical care.
The Division oversees the following areas: Trauma and Emergency General Surgery at George Washington
University Hospital, Surgical Critical Care at George Washington University Hospital, Trauma and Emergency General Surgery at Virginia Hospital Center, the George Washington University Hospital Patient Logistics Center, The George Washington University Hospital Critical Care Transport Ambulance, and the George Washington University Surgical Critical Care Fellowship. The Division consists of eight full-time, trauma/critical care fellowship trained surgeons as well as two general surgeons, ten advanced practitioners, and one surgical critical care fellow. This team is supported by dedicated trauma program nurse directors at each trauma center and also a dedicated cadre of performance improvement nurses, registrars, and injury prevention / outreach coordinators.
Acute Care Surgery at the George Washington University Hospital Center for CTACC
Trauma and Emergency General Surgery at Virginia Hospital Center
The George Washington University Division of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery provides physician and advanced practitioner coverage for trauma and emergency general surgery as well as medical director leadership at Virginia Hospital Center, a State designated Level 2 trauma center and the only trauma center in Arlington, VA. Working with hospital leadership and staff at Virginia Hospital Center, the GW Acute Care Surgery team established this trauma center starting in 2020 and obtained State designation as a trauma center in 2022. The center currently evaluates 1800 injured patients and admits 1100 injured patients per year. The emergency general surgery practice provides care for all non-trauma acute general surgical patients and averages 15-20 operations per week.
The George Washington University Patient Logistics Center and Critical Care Transport Team
The GW Patient Logistics Center (PLC) serves as the center of the bed control system for GW Hospital. Its roles include coordinating all transfers from outside facilities to GW Hospital as well as overseeing patient flow within the Hospital. In doing so, the PLC aligns GW Hospital with our community partners for an 80 miles radius in order to offer the expertise that CTACC and the entire Hospital have to patients throughout the region. The medical directors of the PLC are Dr. Babak Sarani and Dr. Courtney Paul. The PLC oversees over 2000 referrals per year to GW and is staffed by dedicated, ICU-trained triage nurses 24 hours per day, 7 days per week.
Patients can be referred to GW from any outside facility by calling 855-SEND-2-GW (855-736-3249).
The PLC works with the George Washington Critical Care Transport Team in order to quickly facilitate the transfer of severely ill or injured patients. Dr. Babak Sarani serves as the medical director and Ms. Tiffany Coullahan serves as the nurse director of this team, which is staffed by dedicated nurses with advanced skills relevant to the inter-hospital environment as well as with critical care trained paramedics and EMTs. The critical care transport team functions as a mobile intensive care unit – the team is able to provide any care that is traditionally restricted to the ICU setting while transporting a patient in an ambulance. The team transports over 500 patients per year.
In addition to critical care ground transportation, the GW PLC is able to arrange aero-medical flights for patients who are located too far from Washington, D.C. or whose condition is too precarious to allow for ground transportation. In short, the PLC’s moto is "no one is too unstable to transfer."