Biden Harris-Administration, through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), Hosted a Roundtable to Hear Directly from Rural Community Partners About Innovative Approaches to Increasing Access to Health Care Services in Rural Communities

On Monday, November 13, 2023, HRSA Administrator Carole Johnson was joined by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Deputy Secretary Andrea Palm, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director, Dr. Mandy Cohen, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Deputy Administrator and Director of the Center for Medicare Dr. Meena Seshamani, and organizations representing people in rural communities to acknowledge and celebrate National Rural Health Day. 

This roundtable was held to celebrate National Rural Health Day and recognize the innovation of leaders working to ensure access to high quality care in rural communities. National Rural Health Day is a longstanding annual event that highlights the accomplishments of rural health care providers, communities, and organizations working to improve health in rural America.

Deputy Secretary Palm reiterated the Biden-Harris Administration’s rural investments including key activities the Department is leading to support health care in rural communities. HHS has included rural experts in their efforts to address cyber threats to better understand the landscape of current practices and inform future efforts to support and protect providers and patients. She also highlighted the Department's ongoing collaboration with the United States Department of Agriculture and the White House Rural Partnership Network initiative.  

HRSA Administrator Johnson underscored the importance of strengthening the workforce pipeline and commented on the increased investments in rural health care services under the Biden-Harris Administration. “Workforce issues are front and center. We have been leading with the President's leadership on driving the growth of the National Health Services Corps (NHSC) to get more loan repayment to drive more health care providers to rural communities. We’re at a historic high of 20,000 people in the NHSC getting loan repayment and about 7,400 of them are in rural communities. We also were thrilled to receive some of the Public Health Workforce investments from the America Rescue Plan. These are just some of the exciting workforce initiatives we have in rural America.”

All HHS leaders echoed the importance of building capacity and increasing access to quality health care services in rural communities. CDC highlighted the creation of their new Office of Rural Health that will have a coordinating function across the agency and their work to make data available at the county and zip code level to help rural communities understand their needs and use it to address important issues like suicide and opioid use prevention.

CMS noted that addressing rural health inequities is a cornerstone of their efforts to improve health equity and emphasized the importance of partnering with rural health providers, rural communities, beneficiaries, caregivers, and other payers, especially Medicaid. CMS also highlighted their work to support providers, such as through the Rural Emergency Hospital provider type, expanding access through increased graduate medical education slots in rural areas, making tele behavioral health services permanent, and providing advanced payments so rural providers can take advantage of the Medicare Shared Savings Program.

Leadership from the following rural community partners participated in Monday’s event on innovation in rural health care delivery: 

• American Hospital Association
• Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs
• Association of State and Territorial Health Officials
• Grantmakers in Health
• National Association of Community Health Centers
• National Association of Rural Health Clinics
• National Rural Health Association
• National Organization of State Offices of Rural Health

Participants discussed the importance of improving data infrastructure and analysis capacity, leveraging technology, and enhancing obstetric services in rural communities to address health equity. Several of the organizations championed utilizing community health workers as an innovative and sustainable way to integrate community health and principal illness navigation services. All participants stressed the need to be creative and innovative when tackling rural health challenges, echoing this year’s theme for National Rural Health Day. 

This roundtable builds on the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to increase direct service health care, reduce disparities, and expand infrastructure in rural America. At the close of the roundtable, Deputy Secretary Palm assured the group that the Biden Harris Administration will continue to take action to deliver quality, affordable health care to rural America, expand mental health and substance use disorder services, and keep rural facilities open and staffed with dedicated health care professionals.