Rural Health
News by Topic: Health workforce
Dec 2, 2025 - Announces that components of a 2024 regulation establishing federal requirements for nursing home staffing has been repealed. Discusses the burden that had been placed on rural and tribal facilities as a result of the rule.
Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Dec 2, 2025 - Discusses challenges with maintaining infrastructure, essential services, and emergency healthcare in a rural New York county due to workforce shortages. Describes contributors to the shortage including a small pool of workers, limited housing, and an aging population.
Source: Adirondack Explorer
NCD: Request for Information; Disability Clinical Care
Federal Register
Dec 1, 2025 - The National Council on Disability (NCD) is requesting information to inform a policy brief discussing disability clinical care and competency training of medical professionals. Questions for consideration include challenges in incorporating disability clinical care in formal training, application of disability clinical care training to other populations, behavior and attitudes of trained healthcare providers, and existing resources and standards of learning to inform required standards of learning development. Comments are due January 6, 2026.
Source: Federal Register
Dec 1, 2025 - Highlights the work of rural pharmacists around New Mexico and their paths to rural practice. Discusses initiatives to address primary care physician shortages by increasing a pharmacist's scope of practice, efforts to recruit rural students to the pharmacy field, and networking across the state.
Source: UNM Health Sciences News
Nov 25, 2025 - Notice of final rule from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) making changes to the Medicare Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System (OPPS) and the Medicare Ambulatory Surgical Center (ASC) payment system for calendar year 2026, including changes to the amounts and factors used to determine the payment rates for Medicare services paid under the OPPS and those paid under the ASC payment systems. Among other things, this rule also updates the requirements for the Hospital Outpatient Quality Reporting Program, Rural Emergency Hospital Quality Reporting Program, Ambulatory Surgical Center Quality Reporting Program, Overall Hospital Quality Star Rating, and hospitals to make public their standard charge information and enforcement of hospital price transparency. This rule also announces the closure of a teaching hospital and the opportunity to apply for available slots. This rule is effective January 1, 2026. Applications for available resident spots are due by February 19, 2026.
Source: Federal Register
Nov 25, 2025 - Profiles a rural general surgeon practicing in rural Kansas. Describes her path to rural practice beginning with an undergraduate rural pipeline program.
Source: KU School of Medicine Wichita
Nov 24, 2025 - Describes partnerships between the University of Rochester and rural New York schools. Highlights a program to increase the school-based mental healthcare workforce through a graduate student internship, rural-focused professional development, and high school curriculum aiming to introduce students to mental healthcare professions. Also describes other education and professional development collaborations with the University.
Source: University of Rochester News Center
Nov 24, 2025 - Describes the Rural Occupations Workforce Expansion program, an initiative to recruit rural South Carolinians to train for behavioral health jobs. Discusses challenges for local residents in accessing mental health care.
Source: WCSC
Nov 22, 2025 - Describes challenges with sustaining emergency medical services in rural Wyoming, discussing a shortage of volunteers, limited funding, and responding during poor weather.
Source: Cowboy State Daily
Nov 20, 2025 - Discusses health disparities among rural healthcare provider shortages nationally and in Montana. Highlights 2 residency programs in Billings, Montana aiming to address the shortages of internal medicine and psychiatry providers. Describes how rural practice is integrated into the residencies as well as the benefits for both physician residents and rural communities.
Source: The Daily Yonder