Rural Communities

This research report describes patterns in insurance coverage and uninsurance rates in rural and urban areas, reviews non-financial challenges in accessing care faced by many rural residents, and describes disparities in health outcomes between urban and rural areas.

In April 2024, CMS issued the Minimum Staffing Standards for Long-Term Care Facilities and Medicaid Institutional Payment Transparency Reporting final rule which established new minimum nurse staffing requirements for nursing homes by nurse type.

In 2022, 43.3 million Medicare Part D enrollees (82 percent) filled 1.1 billion prescriptions for generic prescription drugs. While most enrollees filled at least one prescription for $2 or less, most (54 percent) paid more than $2 for at least one generic drug. Over 6 million enrollees filled at least one prescription for over $20.

This brief presents estimates of the number and percentage of children whose parents engage in problematic substance use, including past-year substance use and SUD by substance type and child demographics. Key findings include:

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law on March 23, 2010. Since then, the law has led to an historic expansion of health insurance coverage across all states and all demographic groups within the U.S. This Briefing Book features key findings from two dozen reports published in 2021-2022.

Medicaid and the Marketplace are important sources of affordable, comprehensive healthcare coverage for millions of Americans living in rural areas, and the American Rescue Plan bolsters rural coverage options. But challenges in accessing care remain in many rural areas, including provider shortages, infrastructure limitations, and long distances to care.

This research summary and brief describe nine programs and highlight ways they have addressed challenges to serving child welfare-involved parents with substance use issues, with a particular focus on their applicability to rural communities.

This brief summarizes the challenges involved in serving rural child welfare-involved families with substance use issues. We highlight differences between rural and non-rural areas and discuss strategies that could help alleviate difficulties in addressing child welfare cases in rural communities. Key findings include:

The objectives of this research effort were to collect feedback through interviews with physicians in small rural practices on the initial implementation of Medicare’s Quality Payment Program in 2017, a new value-based purchasing program for Medicare physicians.

Access to services, particularly behavioral health and substance use disorder (SUD) treatment services, is challenging in rural and other underserved areas.