After 20 years serving as one of Puna’s much-needed “Band-Aids,” Dan Domizio is hanging up his stethoscope.
Beginning in 1995, Domizio, a native of New York City, settled in Kalapana, working on the medical staff of the Pahoa Family Health Center. There, and later in his role as clinical programs director for the Puna Community Medical Center, he worked to provide urgent medical care for residents in the medically underserved Puna District.
In an email to the Hawaii Tribune-Herald sent on Monday, Domizio, who is a physician assistant, said he would retire from the medical center at the end of June after 20,000 patient visits.
“I wanted to thank all the people of Puna District (and beyond) for all the generous expressions of thanks that have come my way over the last 20 years, living and working in and around Pahoa,” he wrote. “It has been my privilege to enter into your lives and help out along the way. I’ve watched people grow from newborns, to children, to adults married with kids of their own. Many folks have passed on as well, and we share their loss to the community.”
Around 2007, as Puna’s population continued to grow and the 30-mile drive to Hilo Medical Center’s emergency room remained the only option for emergency medical care, Domizio joined with other community leaders to find a way to address slow ambulance response times and lack of medical care access for Puna residents.
“We all knew, the handful of people on the planning committee, everyone knew we needed an emergency room in Puna,” he said. “At the time, we knew we couldn’t build an emergency room, but we could put up a Band-Aid. Offering seven-day-a-week access, you could walk in the door, get yourself taken care of, regardless of whether you had health insurance.”
Over the years, Domizio, along with a dedicated staff, has worked to patch up Puna’s injured and sickly, while planning for the future, including a current project to build a new emergency room facility for Puna.
Domizio said Monday that despite officially being retired, he will “be around and am willing to help out if they need an extra pair of hands from time to time.”
But, he said, “after 40 years as a physician assistant on the front lines of primary care and community development, it is time to back off and pass the torch along.”
Email Colin M. Stewart at cstewart@hawaiitribune-herald.com.