Fierce Healthcare September 12, 2022
The hospital industry is highlighting rural facilities’ financial struggles and impending shutdowns in their continued bid for Congress to renew key funding programs expiring at the end of the month.
In a report (PDF) released Thursday, the American Hospital Association (AHA) cited University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill research data indicating 136 rural hospital closures between 2010 and 2021. Roughly three-quarters of these closures were in states where Medicaid was not expanded or was in place for less than a year.
The closures reached a peak of 19 with the pandemic’s onset in 2020 before plummeting to just two in 2021, which the industry group attributed to payments from the Provider Relief Fund and other COVID-19 assistance.
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