CA CA may lose its only hospital because of a dispute over roads

From Anna B. IbaraCalmness

This story was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

The road debate can cost Glen County his only emergency department.

Glen Medical Center, a hospital with 25 beds in the village agricultural city of Willos, north of Sacramento, is about to lose its title for Critical Access. Without it, administrators say that the hospital cannot afford to remain open because it will lose its increased Medicare recovery and regulatory flexibility.

Glen Medical Center received a letter in April from US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which notify the hospital that it is no longer in line with the distance requirement to qualify as “critical access”. This requirement states that hospitals should be more than 35 miles of first time-or 15 miles of mountain or secondary roads-from the next nearest hospital.

The next closer hospital is the Colusian Medical Center, which the Federal Agency Medicare and Medicaid puts 32 miles south of Glenn Medical Center. This makes the Glenn County Hospital three miles from the qualification distance for the critical title of access. But the local health officers and the Willus Fire Service say that ambulances and most patients take the “more reliable” route of I-5 and highway 20, which makes the distance between hospitals 35.7 miles to resource away to qualify.

About 40% of 30,000 Glenni residents rely on public health insurance programs – Medicaid and Medicare – and 12% live below the poverty line.

“We treat and see and take care of many people who are unprecedented in the community. Many behavioral health crises, many people related to justice, many elderly people, many people without transport. And we are really a rescue line for these people,” said a still chief administrative officer in Glen.

The closure of the only hospital in this district of Sacramento Valley would mean that residents will have to travel further for emergency care and ambulances will take more time in response to 911 calls.

Dr. Jared Garrison, a health official at Glenn, said the loss of the hospital would be a devastating blow to the community. Garrison is worried about the elderly who may be afraid to drive at night and people who have no transport to do it outside the county. Infarcts, strokes, traumatic injuries, and overdose can become more rammed when hospital treatment is delayed.

“If the Glen Medical Center closed, it’s not just a health crisis – it’s an economic and social crisis,” Garrison said. “We will see longer times for emergency response, job loss, reduction of local business and deterioration of health results for our most vulnerable neighbors.”

“This is not the path that people would take”

Both hospitals, Colusa and Glenn, are in the same place since their construction decades ago. In 2001 Glen Medical Center was first approved for participation in the federal Hospital Hospital Program In the same rule of distance. Hospital and district health officials say that nothing has changed geographically.

“We tried to send a few emails backwards and say,” Hey, this is not the path that people would take. This is not the path that the ambulance takes. This is just not right, “Garrison said. The shorter route, he explained, actually takes more time because it involves a district road that often floods and is used mainly by agricultural equipment.

Hospital’s calls to the Federal Agency were unsuccessful. Still, she said she was holding on to one last hope that US reporter Doug Lamalfa, a Republican from Richveil, could make the case of the hospital.

Mark Spanagel, head of headquarters in Lamalfa’s cabinet, told Calmatters that the resolution had not yet been achieved, but that the conversations with the federal agency continue and that the hospital’s situation was under “increased”.

It is estimated that the Federal Agency Medicare and Medicaid will periodically inspect the eligibility of hospitals with critical access. This review began last year and the problem seems to be a reclassification of the roads, Spanagel said.

The Federal Agency did not respond to SalMatters’ request for comment on why changing its way on the roads.

Peggy Willer, Vice President of Policy at the California Hospital Association, said he was aware of four hospitals for critical access in California who had received a similar letter. Two of them, the Bear Valley Hospital in Lake Big Bear and George L. Mee Memorial in Monterey County, have ever resolved their cases and will be allowed to retain their designation of “critical access”.

Third, the hospital for the Santa Ynez Valley house in Solwang also works with the Federal Agency and is considering its capabilities, Willer said. The villa’s healthcare system refused a request for an interview with Calmatters.

Willer explained that hospitals that lose their designation “critical access” may need to apply for other classifications, such as a “low -volume provider” or a “only community hospital”, which also provides improved Medicare payments.

In his letter, the Federal Agency told Glenn Medical Center that until April 23, 2026, it would be placed as another type of hospital to continue to participate in the Medicare program.

Financial Buffer for Hospital for Critical Access

The Clinton Administration created the 1997 critical access program as a way to support rural hospitals. The purpose of the program is to make sure that remote areas, away from cities, have adequate medical attention.

“Our hospital was on the verge of closing in 2001. We received this designation and we held our doors open for the next 24 years,” said at Glen Medical Center. The hospital is owned by American Advanced Management, the same group that A recently purchased and open hospital in the Madera CommunityS

The program gives the hospital a little financial buffer by restoring Medicare recovery higher than the average. Medicare pays hospitals with critical access 101% of costs for most stationary and outpatient services; For comparison, Medicare restores Most other hospitals 82% of costsAccording to the American Hospital Association.

The designation also allows rural hospitals to remain open, even if they do not meet certain standards required by most other acute hospitals. For example, Glenn’s medical center does not have a service room service, and bringing it to the necessary standards is financially prohibiting, he said.

The financial burden of losing its critical mark will be such that the hospital will probably have to close its stationary services until next spring, he said. Outpatient services, such as clinics and laboratories, will remain open.

Like hospitals across the country, Glen Medical Center is also confronted with a separate financial blow in the form of potential redundancies of Medicaid, currently being discussed in Congress. Hospitals can see reduced federal funding and increased costs due to uncompensated care by people who lose their Medicaid coverage. The American Hospital Association judged that Rural hospitals across the country can lose about $ 50 billion In total in federal costs for Medicaid by 2034, if a big beautiful bill of President Donald Trump would have passed, as it was currently drafted.

Last month all members of the Republican House in California vote in support from the budget bill, including La Malfa, which represents the area. The Senate is now discussing its own version of the bill.

In order to raise awareness of the oncoming loss of the hospital from critical status of access, Glenni Medical Center A campaign has recently started Calling residents to write reviews and letters in support.

Without a local hospital, the two ambulances of the county will have to travel further, to the Eloe Medical Center in Chico, about 36 miles north. Garrison explained that the ambulances are likely to choose Elos over the Colusian Medical Center, as it is the bigger than the two and has a traumatic center.

The huge region of the centrally naval part between Mendocino and Plumas’s national forests is already in hospital after the Hospital of the Pervventist River was damaged in the camp at the camp in 2018 and did not open again.

If the ambulances have to expel 45 minutes from the county, instead of the five to ten minutes to a local hospital, this will affect the ability of emergency medical services to respond to 911 calls, Garrison said.

“I was talking to an administrator in Eloe and they thought that this could increase their waiting time by up to two hours,” Garrison said.

Supported by the California Foundation for Health (CHCF), which works to ensure that people have access to the necessary care when they need it, at a price they can afford. Visit www.chcf.org to learn more.

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.