Sponsors (7)
The bill preserves rural hospital access and financial stability by protecting CAH status after infrastructure projects, at the cost of continued higher Medicare spending and reduced pressure to consolidate or reconfigure local services.
Rural communities and small hospitals keep local access to emergency and primary care because Critical Access Hospital (CAH) status — and the financial support that helps keep facilities open — is preserved even after new roads shorten travel times.
Rural hospitals designated as CAHs retain Medicare payment benefits (higher cost-based reimbursements), protecting their revenue and financial viability despite infrastructure changes.
States and hospital systems gain regulatory certainty about CAH eligibility after road or bridge projects, which aids planning and investment decisions.
Taxpayers may continue to pay higher Medicare reimbursements for some facilities that, because of new roads, no longer serve remote populations as originally intended.
Improved access from new infrastructure could reduce incentives to consolidate or reconfigure services, leading to possible duplication of services and inefficiencies in local healthcare delivery.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Treats CAHs as continuing to meet the Medicare distance/transportation criterion if post-designation roadway or bridge improvements would otherwise alter that test.
Official title: To amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to ensure that facilities do not lose critical access hospital status as a result of a roadway or transportation infrastructure improvement.
Introduced June 4, 2026 by Bennie Thompson · Last progress June 4, 2026
Treats a hospital that is or ever was designated a Critical Access Hospital (CAH) as continuing to meet the Medicare distance/transportation requirement even if a roadway or bridge project completed after designation would otherwise change the travel-distance test. It also defines "roadway or transportation infrastructure improvement" to include construction, realignment, widening, or enhancement of highways/roadways and construction or modification of bridges, overpasses, or tunnels. The bill does not appropriate money or change other program rules.