For many residents of Willows, California, that’s the reality in a healthcare crisis. This chaos all started when Glenn Medical Center shuttered its doors on September 30, 2023. The closed hospital had long been a vital community medical resource. It was the only source of critical primary care and dental services to the very northern extremities of California’s Sacramento Valley. Its sudden closure puts the lives of its mostly low-income, highly diverse 28,000-30,000 residents at great risk by denying them ready, emergency medical care.
Founded in 1950, Glenn Medical Center was an original 25-bed critical access hospital. It offered a unique range of cross-cutting services, from responding to heart attacks and car accidents to rescue operations from plane crashes. The hospital earned its critical access designation through the federal government’s Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in 2001. This designation provided the facility the opportunity to receive higher reimbursements from Medicare and provided it staffing exemptions.
The hospital was forced to serve patients whose only insurance option were Medicare or Medicaid. Most of these patients were managing chronic conditions such as diabetes, COPD, asthma and cancer. Glenn County has some of the highest lung and colorectal cancer rates in the entire state. This further underscores the vital services Glenn Medical Center provides.
CMS then decided that Glenn County is no longer considered a rural area. The impact, she noted, resulted in the hospital losing its critical access certification, ultimately forcing the hospital’s closure. Consequently, it now takes residents more than 30 minutes to reach the nearest emergency room. This distance is troubling enough on its own, but poses even greater risks of adverse health consequences during life or death situations.
“This fight is much bigger than any one person or any one hospital or community,” remarked local healthcare advocate Still. He captured his community’s concern and alarm over the abrupt closure, which was meant to take effect by summer 2020. “It’s not over yet. I know this is scary. I know this is frustrating. We haven’t given up.”
Advocates have highlighted Glenn Medical Center’s role as a community lifeline. Still noted, “We take pride in the folks that we keep alive and we bring back from the dead, and it happens more often than you’d like to believe.” Without the hospital, patients needing emergency care will experience longer times to care, leading to deadly outcomes.
Lisa Pruitt, a scholar specializing in rural health, pointed out that “the funding for lots of hospitals is pretty fragile, but with rural hospitals, it’s kind of like a house of cards.” She explained how interdependent funding streams affect these facilities’ viability. “If you’ve already got a fragile house of cards, then you take away one of the cards, it means that the facility is lost.”
Residents have made it clear that the prospect of losing this critical healthcare resource is alarming. Representative Doug LaMalfa lambasted the Federal government’s action on hospital’s closure. “This is not how government is supposed to operate – it’s unfair and just plain wrong,” he stated. LaMalfa vowed to take action and added, “I refuse to believe CMS’s hands are tied, and I will do everything in my power to fix this situation for Glenn County.”
The shutdown of Glenn Medical Center has fueled debate over the national impact on rural access to healthcare. The hospital had the double duty of serving nearby olive orchard workers and the thousands of travelers passing through its doors traveling along Interstate 5. “Being right on I-5, we get a lot of travelers that come through,” Still mentioned. Even though we don’t have an active labor and delivery unit, we’ve delivered two or three live ones here within the last year.
As local leaders and residents push for solutions, many are left wondering about their future access to essential medical services. Thomas, another advocate for healthcare reform in the area, emphasized the necessity of having local hospitals available for emergencies. “I’ve always said if you’re bleeding, broken and stroking, you need that hospital there to take care of you.”
The repercussions of Glenn Medical Center’s closure extend beyond immediate healthcare access. They threaten the community’s overall health and well-being. With many patients relying on chronic disease management services that the hospital provided, local residents face uncertainty regarding their ongoing care.
We’re the front door to our country’s healthcare system. It re-focused reflections on the hospital’s role in the community. Its closing represents a tremendous loss – one that we hope will not be overlooked by advocates and practitioners across the policy spectrum.