Kissimmee Mayor Encourages State to Approve Trauma Center
Friday, July 26, 2013
By: Alicia Mandigo

The Mayor of Kissimmee says his city needs a trauma center- a specialized hospital capable of handling the most severe injuries. Osceola Regional Medical Center in Kissimmee put in an application for a trauma center six months ago, but the Florida Department of Health says its not ready to consider applications- yet.

[City of Kissimmee logo]

Kissimmee Mayor Jim Swan’s position is pretty simple, his city needs a trauma center.

So Swan, along with four other Kissimmee officials, wrote a letter to the Orlando Sentinel editor encouraging the Florida Department of Health to approve a trauma center for Kissimmee. He’s hoping the letter will start people talking. “And maybe bring about some public pressure to get those who make those kinds of final decisions involved in a community discussion and get them to recognize the need as we do,” he says.

The Florida Department of Health said in a written statement that its working to:

     "Create an inclusive, sustainable and integrated System of Trauma Care

      that saves lives of injured patients in Florida." 

That includes devevloping a rule for where to site new trauma centers. Once that rule is in place, the department says it will be able to consider applications from hospitals located in an area already served by a trauma center. Right now the closest trauma center to Kissimmee is in Orlando- a ten minute helicopter ride away. Swan says that’s unacceptable.