Medicare $$ Needed to Help State-Licensed Emergency Centers Survive, Lawmakers Told
If freestanding emergency centers (FECs) are to survive and help underserved rural communities, they should be allowed to receive Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement, which they cannot currently do, an FEC executive told members of the House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee Monday. “The model doesn’t work unless we can get Medicare and Medicaid,” Robert Morris, […]
MedPAC Members Pan Rural Hospitals’ ‘Cost-Plus’ Billing System for Medicare Patients
Rural hospitals’ ability to bill fee-for-service Medicare patients and the uninsured on a “cost-plus” basis — essentially setting their charges at whatever level they think is appropriate — is untenable and must be changed, several members of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) said Thursday. “Charges are made up, inflated in ways that are unbelievable,” […]
Opinion | Challenges (and Rewards) of Being a Rural Doctor
I worked in rural Kentucky for 20 years — all of it in poverty clinics. I suspect I got to know my patients better than someone working in a specialty clinic in a big city. The challenges and rewards of doctoring are unique to each specialty, but these are the challenges and rewards I experienced […]
Opinion | Can Healthcare Deserts Be Transformed Into Oases?
Providing first-rate healthcare to underserved rural and urban communities is one of the great unmet challenges of recent decades. These low-income neighborhoods have been left behind and feel the pain of healthcare shortages most acutely. The root of this problem is a misaligned system of incentives. Healthcare providers have had little financial motivation to offer […]
What Will Ensure Rural Hospitals’ Survival? More $$ and Good Broadband, Experts Say
What do rural hospitals need from Congress and state legislatures to survive, besides more money? The answer is — more money, several experts and hospital lobbyists said Wednesday during a webinar sponsored by the Bipartisan Policy Center. Asked that question, George Pink, PhD, deputy director of the Rural Health Research Program at the University of […]
200 Rural Hospitals At Risk of Closing in the Next Few Years, Study Finds
Hundreds of rural hospitals are at risk of closing in the coming years, according to a new study, and the reason may be surprising. “In general, the major cause for the losses at the smallest hospitals were private payers,” study author Harold Miller, MS, president and CEO of the Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment […]