By Marie Powell, former staff member
This week our Throwback Thursday - #tbt - Top 10 Rural Research Reports rundown focuses on our health care research.
We're nerdishly modest, but it's no exaggeration to say we were among the first rural organizations to focus on health care. You'll see why as our countdown continues with number 8.
#8 Health Care Reform / Affordable Care Act Series
by Jon Bailey and numerous co-authors, 2010-2015
This series (25 reports and still counting) analyzed health care and the Affordable Care Act (ACA), especially for their connection to rural people and rural places. We have looked at issues from mental health services in rural America, to ways to increase the number of health care professionals in rural communities, to how specific provisions of the ACA work (or don’t work) for rural people. The series illuminated a host of health care topics for rural people.
As the new health care law was debated and implemented, the series found ways for the law to better respond to rural health care concerns. We provided recommendations to make the law more rural-friendly. Readers were able to see how the ACA affected their lives and how it related to the unique health care challenges in rural America.
The ACA was subject to so many falsehoods and misinformation that the primary purpose of this series – and its ultimate importance to rural communities – was to provide a fact-based analysis of the new health care law and its connections to rural people and rural places.
We looked into how the new health care law would affect small business, rural communities, seniors on Medicare, rural young adults, prevention, and public health, among other issue areas. The Affordable Care Act series can be found here.
