Rural Spotlight

New CMS Model: MAHA ELEVATE – Coming in Early 2026

January 2, 2026

New CMS Model: MAHA ELEVATE – Coming in Early 2026

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) announced a new payment model titled Make America Healthy Again: Enhancing Lifestyle and evaluating Value-based Approaches Through Evidence (MAHA ELEVATE). The model aims to support chronic disease initiatives for fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries.

A total of $100 million dollars will fund up to 30 proposals for three years. The proposals will include evidence-based whole-person care approaches currently not covered by original Medicare.

CMMI will release a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) in early 2026 for the first cohort, and the voluntary model will launch on September 1, 2o26.

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Research Alert: Changes in Bed-Based Measures of Surge Capacity from 2018 to 2022 Among Rural and Urban Hospitals

January 2, 2026

Research Alert: Changes in Bed-Based Measures of Surge Capacity from 2018 to 2022 Among Rural and Urban Hospitals

Hospital surge capacity refers to the ability to handle sudden and possible dramatic increases in health care demand, such as the increase in demand experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic, a natural disaster, or a mass casualty event. One method of assessing surge capacity is to examine a hospital’s typical number of unoccupied beds.

On an average day in 2022, the average rural hospital had 24 unoccupied acute care beds, accounting for approximately 66% of the hospital’s total acute care beds. Although these numbers have decreased slightly from 2018 (26 unoccupied beds accounting for approximately 67% of total beds), the findings suggest that surge capacity, as measured by unoccupied beds, has not dramatically changed in recent years.

Click Here to Read Full Report

Webinar: Outcomes: Strategic Data-Driven Interventions, February 12

January 2, 2026

Webinar: Outcomes: Strategic Data-Driven Interventions, February 12

Join subject matter experts from Community Health Center, Inc. (CHCI) for an interactive 60-minute activity session on designing meaningful community health interventions. Through hands-on case studies and collaborative discussions, this session will explore the importance of data, connect their individual mission to broader healthcare goals, and develop practical strategies for robust data collection, impactful patient outreach, and transformative care delivery.

Target Audience:

  • Dental,
  • Nurses,
  • Nurse practitioners,
  • Pharmacists,
  • Physicians’ assistants,
  • Psychologists and counselors,
  • Registered dieticians,
  • Social workers, and
  • Other members of the team.

Cost: Free

When: Thursday, February 12, 3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Click Here to Register

Webinar: Improving Health Outcomes: Strategic Data-Driven Interventions, January 29

January 2, 2026

Webinar: Improving Health Outcomes: Strategic Data-Driven Interventions, January 29

Join subject matter experts from Community Health Center, Inc. (CHCI) for an engaging 60-minute webinar on advancing community health through meaningful data collection and use. Participants will learn practical strategies for collecting data to design community health interventions that will improve health outcomes, as well as staff training approaches that enhance organizational understanding.

Target Audience:

  • Dental
  • Nurses
  • Nurse practitioners
  • Pharmacists
  • Physicians
  • Physicians’ assistants
  • Psychologists and counselors
  • Registered dieticians
  • Social workers
  • Other members of the team

Cost: Free

When: Thursday, January 29, 3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Click Here to Register

Recapping 2025 Rural Health Advocacy Wins

January 2, 2026

Recapping 2025 Rural Health Advocacy Wins

Through advocacy efforts, NRHA educates Congress and the Administration on health care issues important to rural America. NRHA connects thousands of rural health stakeholders with local, state, and federal lawmakers, ensuring that policy requests are heard by those with the power to enact change at every level.

The National Rural Health Association (NRHA) is excited to share their 2025 Advocacy Report, summarizing NRHA’s key wins including legislative, administrative, regulatory, and state-level victories, as well as grassroots engagement.

Click Here to Read the Report

On-Demand Webinar: Modernizing Clinical Networks: How IT Leaders are Building Infrastructure for Smarter Care

January 2, 2026

On-Demand Webinar: Modernizing Clinical Networks: How IT Leaders are Building Infrastructure for Smarter Care

Inpatient, outpatient, EDs and Ors – every care setting now relies on reliable, high-performance connectivity. But outdated networking infrastructure and reactive management practices are straining clinical and IT operations, leading to costly disruptions and mounting risk.

This session will explore how healthcare CIOs, CTOs and network leaders are redesigning their environments to meet growing care demands, support digital transformation and hardwire resilience into their systems.

Learnings include:

  • Lower operating costs by automating network monitoring and maintenance,
  • Support clinical mobility and reduce downtime across inpatient and ambulatory care, and
  • Free up IT teams to focus on clinical innovation, not troubleshooting.

Click Here to Access this On-Demand Webinar

On-Demand Webinar: The Cost of Getting it Wrong: Smarter Verification for a Tighter Budget

January 2, 2026

On-Demand Webinar: The Cost of Getting it Wrong: Smarter Verification for a Tighter Budget

Budget cuts, identity fraud, and adversarial AI are putting critical security functions like verification at risk. But as regulations tighten and fraud becomes more sophisticated, getting it wrong has real consequences.

Manual verification, weak authentication, and account recovery vulnerabilities are being exploited.

In this session, hear how health systems are automating user journeys, prioritizing identity verification and making smarter security investments with cost in mind.

Key Takeaways:

  • How identity gaps impact patient, payer, and provider safety, revenue cycle and compliance,
  • Where automation delivers quick wins in authentication and verification, and
  • How to invest in security without overextending your budget or infuriating users.

Click Here to Access On-Demand Webinar

eBook: Where Progress Meets Purpose: How 3 Systems Turned Data into Outcomes

January 2, 2026

eBook: Where Progress Meets Purpose: How 3 Systems Turned Data into Outcomes

Rising costs, fragmented systems and performance pressures are pushing hospitals to their limits. But some health systems are turning that pressure into progress – using trusted data and cross-functional collaboration to drive measurable improvement. For nearly twenty years, Health Catalyst has worked alongside healthcare organizations to tackle the toughest challenges they face. We’ve seen what works, what doesn’t, and what it takes to turn your vision into massive, measurable, data-informed healthcare improvement.

The eBook distills strategies from leading health systems into a clear playbook for driving clinical, operational and financial results. From cutting sepsis mortality to automating population health outreach, these organizations show what’s possible when data drives action, not just insight.

You’ll learn about:

  • Proven frameworks that help teams cut through complexity and act decisively.
  • How technology and services work together to solve your unique use cases.
  • Real-world use cases showing how outcomes deliver lasting impact, including a 20% analytics capacity gain and a 23% relative drop in sepsis mortality.

Click Here to download eBook

Transform Virtual Series: One Virtual Series. Three Summits. Same Mission: Strengthen Hospitals from the Inside Out

December 31, 2025

Transform Virtual Series: One Virtual Series. Three Summits. Same Mission: Strengthen Hospitals from the Inside Out

Healthcare leaders are facing one of the most challenging moments in recent history with policy shifts, funding cuts, workforce shortages, and more. The pressure to deliver more with less has never been more intense. The need for stronger, more resilient operations has never been clearer.

Transform Virtual Series helps you meet this moment. The new, multi-week format is built to go deeper than ever before. Instead of a single day, they have dedicated three focused half-day summits to the operational areas under the greatest strain and where predictable, efficient, AI powered operations matter most for sustainable growth:

  • Inpatient Flow (February 10)
  • Perioperative Services (February 17)
  • Infusion Centers (February 24)

Transform proves why AI is the only scalable path to unlocking capacity and enabling enterprise transformation. Each summit delivers the strategies and success stories that strengthen margins, expand access, and improve performance without adding resources.

You’ll walk away with:

  • Proven ROI
    • See how better operations improve both mission and margin by creating capacity, protecting the workforce, and delivering sustainable growth system-wide.
  • AI powered strategies
    • Enable resilience not through hype, but through cutting-edge technology that delivers real outcomes.
  • Executive insights
    • Connect with healthcare leaders from across the country and apply immediate learnings to improve access, efficiency, flow, and experience.

Click Here to Learn More and Register

Whitepaper: The State of the Healthcare Consumer Experience

December 31, 2025

Whitepaper: The State of the Healthcare Consumer Experience

Eight five percent of healthcare consumers consider perceived safety when choosing a provider – and this assessment starts online, not at the front desk. Outdated listings, unclear communication and disjointed workflows can erode trust before a visit even begins.

Press Ganey’s recent Healthcare Consumer Experience report reveals how safety, digital transparency and social capital drive trust, loyalty and long-term growth. Based on insights from over 6.5 million patient encounters and a national survey, the report offers a strategic roadmap for executives.

Learnings Include:

  • Why patient perceptions of safety directly impact likelihood to recommend (LTR),
  • How shared purpose among care teams builds loyalty from within, and
  • Where digital friction undermines trust and how to fix it.

Click Here to Download Whitepaper