Rural Hospitals in North Carolina

The Medicare Rural Hospital Flexibility (FLEX) Program was established by the Balanced Budget Act (BBA) of 1997 in the creation of critical access hospitals (CAHs). CAH designation allows the hospital to be reimbursed on a reasonable cost basis for inpatient and outpatient services provided to Medicare patients (including lab and qualifying ambulance services) and, in some states, Medicaid patients.

Through the FLEX Program, the North Carolina Healthcare Association (NCHA) in partnership with the NC Office of Rural Health, is assisting hospitals in assessing current performance, identifying gaps, and developing improvement plans to address identified opportunities for the Medicare Beneficiary Quality Improvement Program (MBQIP) core measures for inpatient, outpatient, care transitions, and patient experience measures. Learn more.

The key function of the Small Rural Hospital Improvement Program funding is to support small rural hospital systems in developing programs that support quality and value driven improvement efforts to promote better patient outcomes.

To achieve this goal, the North Carolina Healthcare Foundation through innovative programming will support organizational capacity building through emphasis on a core foundation for hospital quality programs that strategically align patient safety, quality, finance, and operational improvements. Learn more.

The North Carolina Healthcare Foundation (NCHF) is facilitating partnerships to improve health outcomes through community-led, systems-level solutions and sustainable collaborative investments. Learn more.