Of the nearly 6,000 hospitals in this country, fewer than 300 have certified trauma centers. Different from emergency rooms, trauma centers are better staffed and better equipped to handle the most serious injuries in minutes.

But in the last five years, 25 have shut their doors, forcing patients to be rushed somewhere else for treatment, sometimes hundreds of miles away.

For trauma centers, it's their very own state of emergency. They’re bleeding red ink from too many patients who can’t pay. Last year, CBS News reported that the nation’s trauma centers lost $1 billion collectively.

At Memorial Hospital’s trauma center in South Bend, administrators can certainly sympathize. Last year for homicide victims, the hospital wrote off more than a third of the bill to charity.

"If a patient comes in as a shooting or a stabbing [victim], typically those patients don’t have your typical insurance and we don’t get paid for those cases,” said Dr. Scott Thomas in a November interview about trauma care. “If you're injured we're going to take care of you. That's our job as a trauma center. But it is a huge burden on society, it’s a huge burden on the facilities and many trauma centers are rethinking the whole concept of being a trauma center because the costs of being a trauma center are so high.”

But administrators say South Bend’s trauma center is not in danger of closing.

“We’re better every year,” said Jayne Mitten, director of surgical and trauma services. “We’re very committed to providing services and becoming the best in the nation.”

In November, after a lengthy inspection and review, the American College of Surgeons renewed Memorial as a certified level 2 trauma center.

But just because it’s not in immediate trouble doesn’t mean administrators aren’t concerned and asking for help to make sure the doors stay open. They’re supporting the push for state and federal funding for trauma centers. So far, 14 states now offer just that, through everything from tobacco sales to casino gaming.

So far, no bills have been introduced to use state money in Indiana for trauma centers. But they could benefit from a bill in the U.S. Senate. It would provide $100 million in support for trauma center across the country.

To date, 14 states provide public funds to support their trauma centers: