Grady Memorial Hospital will get about half the money it wanted to help pay for its underfunded trauma center, a state panel decided Monday.

But the amount is twice the allocation for any other trauma center in the state.

The Georgia Trauma Care Network Commission voted to give Grady $12.7 million to help defray the costs of care for patients with traumatic injuries who cannot pay for their treatment.

The commission's vote capped a 90-minute meeting in which the panel, composed of physicians, hospital administrators and EMS specialists, laid out a funding plan for 15 trauma centers across the state. All the centers, the commission said, need more cash.

Grady's allotment eclipsed that of every other center in the state, said commission Chairman Dennis Ashley. He's the trauma chief at the Medical Center of Central Georgia in Macon, which received $3.55 million.

"Grady got four times what we got," he said. "If you break it down in comparison to the other centers, Grady is very well-funded."

Atlanta's Grady, he said, deserves the amount because it handles so many trauma cases each year.

"They do the lion's share of the work," he said. "They deserve the lion's share of the funding."

It's still not enough, said state Sen. Vincent Fort (D-Atlanta), a longtime Grady supporter. He watched while the nine-member panel approved a $58.9 million budget to support trauma centers, physicians and EMS units. The plan includes $6.47 million for EMS operations and $11.9 million for physician costs.

"I'm a little bit flabbergasted" with Grady's allotment, Fort said. "Twelve million [dollars] is 12 million, but we wish it had been more."

Commission members devised the plan to tide centers over until the end of the fiscal year by collecting information from trauma care providers across the state, then matching the numbers with the money they'd received from the state.

The trauma care providers will get the money by June 30, the end of this fiscal year.

The panel's vote highlighted the financial woes facing Georgia's four major trauma centers —- Grady, plus facilities in Macon, Savannah and Augusta —- as well as smaller facilities.

The centers, large and small, need at least $80 million in annual state funding to cover the costs of uninsured or under-insured patients, the commission said. "One-hundred million would be better," Ashley said.

Memorial Health University Medical Center in Savannah got $5.66 million. Augusta's Medical College of Georgia received $5.07 million.

The plan, commission members noted, is a temporary fix. Lawmakers, they said, need to approve a formula to help centers pay for uncompensated trauma care from year to year.

"If we don't have sustainable funding for next year," said Ashley, "then what we did here today won't last."