ArticleMedical care research and review : MCRR2025
The Impact of Rural Hospital Closures and Mergers on Health System Ecologies: A Scoping Review.
Article in Medical care research and review : MCRR, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
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Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- Medical deserts and uneven access: a U.S.-anchored critical conceptual review.International journal for equity in health · 2026Review
- Bridging Gaps in Acute Care Access for Rural Veterans: The Reach and Impact of VA's Virtual Emergency and Urgent Care Programs.The Journal of rural health : official journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Despite playing a pivotal role in rural community health services delivery and in local economies, rural hospitals in the United States have closed or merged with larger health networks at alarming rates. This scoping review examines what is known about the impacts of rural hospital closures and mergers since 2010. Using the literature, we inductively derived a new Health System Ecologies Impact Matrix research tool to assess knowledge related to health system changes. Most of the included studies examined closures, primarily reporting on community impacts. Knowledge gaps remain related to financial-, workforce-, and utilization-related outcomes, and little is known about impacts on neighboring hospitals and communities. Few studies report effects of rural hospital mergers, primarily focusing on financial and utilization outcomes for the merged hospital. No studies examined the impacts of rural hospital mergers on patients or individuals and their social environments.
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Registered trials
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