From the Clarion-Ledger:
Last year, the Mississippi Business Journal looked at the prospects for Mississippi local hospitals in the changing national and state health care policy environment. MHA’s Center for Rural Health director Mendal Kemp told the publication:
“The payer mix dictates how you are doing financially. Some of the small rural hospitals particularly depend heavily on Medicare and Medicaid. They have no private commercial insurance patients to speak of. That is why the (federal reimbursement) cuts are doubly bad for the small rural hospitals. Those are the ones at the greatest risk of closure.”
