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When seven rural hospitals decided to pursue federal rural health transformation funding together, the first step was getting rivals into the same room. “We left all our competition at the door, and in the room, we began to brainstorm: How…
The beginning of Stephanie Everett’s tenure as administrator and CEO of Mountrail County Health Center in Stanley, N.D., will be impossible to forget: Two weeks after she took the helm in March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic hit. “I think anybody…
When Albert Wright Jr., PharmD, became CEO of Morgantown-based WVU Medicine in 2014, the system had five hospitals. It now has 31 across four states, and its largest deal yet just took it into Pittsburgh’s suburbs. That reach is deliberate,…
After a brief post-pandemic lull, hospital consolidation is accelerating again, with large health systems expanding across state lines, absorbing independent hospitals and reshaping regional care markets. From portfolio resets and strategic exits to cross-market mergers and billion-dollar investments, these moves…
When Tawny Sandifer, MSN, RN, chief nursing officer at Columbus (Neb.) Community Hospital, looks at her nursing staff, she sees what she calls an “inverted experience pyramid”: a workforce weighted heavily toward newer graduates, with fewer of the seasoned nurses…
States are earmarking specific slices of their Rural Health Transformation Program dollars for technology upgrades, service expansions and workforce pipeline development. CMS has announced 54 such efforts since August. Each state’s full fiscal year 2026 award was set in December…
For many rural hospitals, financial pressure stems less from a lack of resources than from value lost in the ones they already have. Becker’s asked rural healthcare leaders where patients, capacity, reimbursement and strategic assets are losing value, and many…
The wave of maternity service closures has shown no signs of slowing down in 2026. As hospitals continue to grapple with persistent financial pressures, staffing shortages and falling birth rates, more facilities weigh ending labor and delivery services. The closures…
Amy Hart, CEO of Cuyuna Regional Medical Center in Crosby, Minn., understands as well as anyone in her position that varied perspectives are valuable in leadership — and that it can be lonely at the top. In that vein, she…
Rural hospitals stand to lose $1.6 billion in revenue in 2026 following the expiration of the ACA’s enhanced premium tax credits, according to an Oct. 13 report from the American Hospital Association. The report, “America’s Rural Hospitals at a Crossroads,”…