Economy boosts safety-net hospitals in states not expanding Medicaid

Hospitals that treat many poor and uninsured patients were expected to face tough financial times in states that did not expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. That's because they would get less Medicare and Medicaid funding under the health-care law, while still having to provide high levels of charity care. But in some of the largest states that did not expand Medicaid, many "safety net" hospitals fared pretty well last year — better than in 2013 in many cases, according to their financial documents. Kaiser Health News looked at the performance of about a dozen such hospitals in Florida, Texas, Georgia, Tennessee, South Carolina, Virginia and Kansas, which released their 2014 financial results.