Inside three rural hospitals in crisis

Last week saw numerous mainstream media accounts of the troubles facing specific rural hospitals and the resulting negative impacts on the small communities they serve.

Williamston, N.C.

NPR affiliate WUNC in Chapel Hill, N.C., focused on the small town of Williamston, N.C., the seat of Martin County, which has approximately 22,000 total residents. Its hospital, Martin General, abruptly shut down in 2023.

Now local leaders and ECU Health are seeking funding to reopen the facility as a rural emergency hospital. ECU Health officials told WUNC that a $220 million allocation from the state legislature will be required to cover facility costs for the hospital and a new tower at ECU Health’s Beaufort Hospital, 30 minutes away in Washington, N.C., which would treat patients who require longer-term and specialized care. (Read WUNC’s full report here.)

Hugo, Colo.

Colorado Public Radio reported on 15-bed critical access facility Lincoln Health Community Hospital and Care Center in Hugo, a town on Colorado's Eastern Plains approximately 100 miles southeast of Denver. The outlet describes the area as having “a population of less than 10,000 people in an area the size of the state of Connecticut," with the hospital the only one within a 75-mile radius.

Brianna Fox, MD, the hospital’s chief of staff, told Colorado Public Radio that “a shadow had been cast” by nearly a trillion dollars in federal cuts to Medicaid as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, along with Affordable Care Act tax subsidies not being renewed. She worries about how the federal funding cuts can possibly be made up at the state level. (Read Colorado Public Radio’s full report, which delves into the Hugo hospital as well as the larger nationwide picture for rural hospitals, here.)

Elgin, N.D.

State government “watchdog reporting” site North Dakota Monitor posted a podcast  that focuses on Jacobson Memorial Hospital Care Center in Elgin, North Dakota, which it said is “at risk of closing due to severe financial trouble” as lawmakers considered a bill this week “that would give the hospital a lifeline” via a low-interest loan from the Bank of North Dakota, cost-saving measures and an application for federal rural healthcare funding.