Real, Rural Health Care Solutions

Increasing, Rural Americans Can Look to the Sky to Address Health Access Issues

Every day, rural Americans find themselves farther from medical care. The challenges facing rural health care access may be significant, but rural residents can take individual actions to make a difference for themselves, their families and even their communities.

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Heart disease, cancer, unintentional injuries, chronic lower respiratory disease and stroke. These top five causes of death in the United States all have a higher incidence of death among rural residents and research points to lack of access to health care as a culprit.

Today, rural hospitals are closing at a rapid pace, expanding an already vast health care desert (defined as inhabited areas more than 60 minutes away from an acute care hospital) across the country.

According to the University of North Carolina’s Rural Health Research Program, since 2010, more than 105 of America’s 1,700 rural hospitals have closed. Additionally, a Navigant report found that 21% of rural hospitals are at high…