February 7, 2025

New JRH Brief Report: “Everything cannot be handled virtually”

This qualitative study assessed internet access and use, barriers, and facilitators to participating in digital health interventions or programs, and the engagement experience in virtual versus in-person health interventions among rural adults and rural cancer survivors.

Conclusions

Findings from this qualitative study provide an in-depth understanding of the intricate experiences of rural adults and rural cancer survivors when engaging with digital health technologies.

Integrating the experiences of rural adults and rural cancer survivors may aid in developing clinical and community-based interventions and policies that support increasing access to digital health services and programs for rural communities.

Click Here to read full report

February 7, 2025

New JRH Article on Digital Health Technology

The National Journal of Rural Health (JRH) recently published a new article on Medicare telehealth utilization by Rural Health Clinics (RHCs) and Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) prior to and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Click Here to Read full article

February 5, 2025

Why Travel Time is Better Indicator of Access than Zip Codes

Patients who travel longer distances to emergency facilities are more likely to present with more severe medical conditions, highlighting travel time as a key indicator of health care access. Additionally, health care leaders look a how organizations can use social determinants of health to reduce disparities in underserved communities.

Click Here to Read “Travel time is better indicator of access than ZIP codes, study suggests”.

Click Here to Read “Reducing Disparities and Promoting Health Equity in Underserved Communities with Social Determinants of Health”.

February 5, 2025

New JRH Articles on Physical Therapy Utilization and More

The National Rural Health Association’s (NRHA’s) Journal of Rural Health (JRH) published articles on the following topics:

• Influence of rurality on self-reported physical therapy utilization among patients with severe chronic back pain.
  • Examines the association of rurality and physical therapy utilization among a nationally representative sample of individuals with severe chronic back pain.
• Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias among Medicare beneficiaries.
  • Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) are a significant public health concern characterized by memory decline that, over time, leads to loss of independence.
  • This study reports ADRD diagnosis rates among Medicare beneficiaries aged ≥ 65 years in rural America.
• A new model-based approach for estimating rural hospital markets.
  • To provide a new approach for defining rural hospital markets.
• Cognitive impairment and limited health literacy are associated with poor health outcomes among patients with heart failure residing in rural areas.
  • To determine the relationships among cognitive function, health literacy, and cardiac event-free survival (i.e., heart failure hospitalizations and cardiac mortality) in rural patients with heart failure.
• Examining differences in Rural and Urban Medicare FFS Beneficiaries’ Emergency Department Use Before and During COVID.
  • This brief examines changes in emergency department (ED) use among rural and urban Medicare Fee-for-Service (FFS) beneficiaries before and during the COVID-19 pandemic (2018 – 2022). Using claims data, researchers identified shifts in care-seeking behavior, admission patterns, and outcomes.

February 5, 2025

These are the Top 5 Policies to Transform Rural Health

As a new administration takes the reins in Washington, the National Rural Health Association (NRHA) is mobilizing to work with policymakers to implement transformative policy changes to improve rural health care and other hospital leaders are also expressing their concerns.

Top 5 Policies to Transform Rural Health

• Reduce regulator burden on small rural providers.
• Secure key rural health care programs.
• Make Medicare Advantage work for rural health care.
• Stop implementation of payment policies harmful to rural providers.
• Sustain rural health care infrastructure.

NRHA CEO Alan Morgan has released a statement as a rebuttal to the troublesome findings in a recent OIC report on CAH swing bed reimbursement. We can address the needs of rural communities and their hospitals through direct advocacy.

Click Here to Read “The top 5 policies to transform rural health”.

Click Here to Read “What hospitals want from Donald Trump and the new Congress”.

Click Here to Read “NRHA statement on OIG swing bed report”.

Click Here to Read “Cut swing-bed pay rates to match skilled nursing reimbursement and save billions, OIG tells CMS”.