In Chaska, MN, a free-standing urgent care and emergency department just opened its doors. It is a medical center with24/7 ER, urgent care, and specialty clinics, but there is no hospital. Before Two Twelve Medical Center opened Feb. 1, Chaska's city administrator told the Minneapolis Star, "It was quite a trek to get to a hospital emergency room, either by ambulance or driving."
The city's foresight in planning the facility in partnership with Ridgeview Medical Center—it was five years in the making—underscores some of the differences between the healthcare needs of rural and exurban populations versus city and suburban dwellers.
The idea of a freestanding urgent care and emergency clinic may not be high on the list of urban healthcare leaders, but insight into the priorities of rural healthcare executives offers some context.
In the just-released 2011 HealthLeaders Media Industry Survey, survey participants from several industry sectors answered questions about the Patient Protection Act, accountable care organizations, primary care, relationships with payers, reimbursements, and finances, revealing telling differences among rural and non-rural healthcare leadership goals and concerns.
- The top priority for rural leaders over the next three years is quality and patient safety, the second is physician recruitment and retention, and the third is reimbursement. Their non-rural counterparts’ top three priorities are cost reduction, quality/patient safety, and developing an accountable care organization.
- Only 28%have positive or very positive assessment of the Patient Protection Act. That's compared to 38% of their non-rural colleagues.
- Survey respondents place a high value on nursing, with 74% reporting that the CNO is part of their senior executive team, compared to 58% of non-rural leaders. Not surprisingly, 29% say the nurse supply will have a strongly negative impact on their organizations, compared to 2% of non-rural leaders.
The high impact of nursing staff in rural health systems is clear. And seeing as how patient satisfaction scores will soon be tied to reimbursement, it's no coincidence that leaders want to engage nurses and elevate them into positions of senior management. Nurses are key to boosting patient satisfaction scores.
There's much more to glean from the Industry Survey. Other sectors highlighted include Leadership, Finance, Marketing, Technology, Quality, Physicians, Health Plans, Nurse Leaders, and Service Lines. Click here, to see full results.