Medicare and Medicaid Program; Criteria for a Rural Hospital To Be Designated as an Essential Access Community Hospital (EACH)

This final rule revises the criteria that a rural hospital must meet to be designated as an Essential Access Community Hospital (EACH). The revised criteria permit HCFA to designate a hospital as an EACH if the hospital cannot be designated as an EACH by the State only because it has fewer than 75 beds and is located 35 miles or less from another hospital. Hospitals in rural areas that are designated as EACHs by HCFA are treated, for payment purposes, as sole community hospitals. The revised criteria are designed to facilitate development of network affiliations between rural EACHs and small rural facilities, known as Rural Primary Care Hospitals (RPCHs). The revisions would affect only hospitals located in rural areas of the States of California, Colorado, Kansas, South Dakota, New York, West Virginia, and North Carolina, or in an adjacent State.