by James C. Sherlock
Becker’s Healthcare, a widely read medical news organization, published a story on Friday, “892 hospitals at risk of closure, state by state.” Rural hospitals were the topic.
It cited as its source a report from a non-profit named The Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform (CHQPR), which presents itself as “a national policy center that facilitates improvements in healthcare payment and delivery systems.”
The CHQPR report Rural Hospitals at Risk of Closing claims that twelve of Virginia’s “27″ rural hospitals are at immediate risk of closing. It certainly engaged my interest.
Another CHQPR report, The Crisis in Rural Health Care, has an interactive map where the twelve perhaps can be found.
But the sources of both reports are a mystery, at least to me.
- First it must be noted that the Virginia Department of Health lists only 20 rural hospitals in the state.
- Only five of them lost money in 2020 (see the column “Revenue and Gains in Excess of Expenses and Losses”).
- Four of those are owned by large and profitable health systems that use them to feed more profitable cases to other system hospitals.
It is dangerous to the cause of improving rural healthcare to create “reports” like this. Continue reading