Maine to get $190M in federal funding to improve rural health care access

By Carol Bousquet, Maine Public

The government says the Rural Health Transformation Program is intended to help residents in rural Maine have better access to preventive, primary, maternal and behavioral health services. It comes at a time when hospital services and Medicaid are being cut.

States, including Maine, will use fitness and nutrition programs such as the Food As Medicine initiative to address the root causes of chronic disease and manage those conditions.

Emergency care will include treat-in-place options and expanded telehealth technology to improve remote patient monitoring.

Funding will also support growing the clinical workforce with training, residencies and recruitment and retention incentives to replace clinicians who are retiring.

Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins said in a statement that while the money cannot solve every challenge facing our state’s rural health care system it comes “at a time when many rural health care providers are facing significant financial hardship.”

Maine is expected to lose billions of dollars of Medicaid funding in 2027.

This story appears through a media partnership with Maine Public.