Healthcare leaders in Rhode Island are sounding the alarm on an overall shortage of care across the state.
“Healthcare should be one of the top priorities in the state, but clearly it wasn’t,” said Brown Health President and CEO John Fernandez.
Fernandez and other healthcare leaders asked the state legislature for an additional $70 million in the 2027 state budget to fund Medicaid reimbursements.
Brown Health President and CEO John Fernandez spoke with NBC 10. (WJAR)
Medicaid enrollment rates are high in Rhode Island but the state reimburses care at lower rates than Massachusetts and Connecticut.
The budget allocation would’ve been matched by federal funding, but despite a state revenue surplus, the ask wasn’t approved.
Instead, the legislature provided $26 million to be shared amongst all Rhode Island hospitals.
“We take care of those patients on Medicaid that are people in the state of Rhode Island who are low income. We take care of them and we expect to get paid what it costs for us to do,” said Fernandez. “Right now, that’s not happening.”
Without the additional funding, Fernandez says facility projects like construction at Miriam Hospital and Rhode Island Hospital will flatline.
“We’re likely going to have to delay that project, if not cancel it,” he said of the Rhode Island Hospital project. “We will not have made the margins we need to make to pay for it.”
According to Brown University President Christina Paxson, Rhode Island’s low Medicaid reimbursement rate could drive talent to neighboring states.
“Unless we shore up our healthcare systems, make them strong, make physicians wants to come to and work in Rhode Island, we’re going to continue to have this problem,” Paxson said.
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NBC 10 asked Gov. Dan McKee’s office why more of the budget wasn’t allocated toward Medicaid reimbursement but has not yet heard back.