Barrett Hospital & HealthCare will close its home health &
hospice care program. Like many healthcare organizations across the country, Barrett Hospital & HealthCare has felt the impacts of the ongoing labor shortages. Due to these shortages, Barrett Hospital & HealthCare will no longer be able to accept new patients for home health & hospice.
Barrett Hospital & HealthCare will continue providing excellent care to the very limited number of patients in the home health & hospice program while plans are developed with family members and other facilities to complete and transition patient care seamlessly. Multiple organizations have expressed an interest to provide some or all of the affected services in the future, and Barrett Hospital & HealthCare is engaging with those organizations to support their efforts. Current home health & hospice staff members will be given an opportunity to transition to other roles within Barrett Hospital & HealthCare once all current patients are discharged from service.
“Our community is not exempt from the serious national shortage of healthcare workers. Over
the past year, it has become increasingly difficult to find nursing staff to support our home
health & hospice program. Home Health & Hospice Manager, Gina Miller, RN and her team have worked hard to help with recruiting and to keep the program going. On behalf of the
organization, I appreciate the exhaustive efforts they have made,” says Taylor Rose, Chief
Executive Officer.
Board of Directors President, Patti Mitchell echoed those sentiments. “Attempting to fill staffing vacancies has been a challenge. The supply of healthcare workers isn’t what it used to be. And at some point, the Board of Directors had to acknowledge that. Many considerations were taken into account as Barrett has provided this service for many, many years. It was not a decision that we made lightly.”
About Barrett Hospital & HealthCare:
Established in 1922, Barrett Hospital & HealthCare is a non-profit Critical Access Hospital (CAH) and medical clinic provider in Dillon, Montana. Based on The Chartis Center’s Rural Hospital Performance Index, the National Rural Health Association (NRHA) has recognized Barrett Hospital & HealthCare as a Top 20 CAH five times, including in 2022. For more information, visit www.barretthospital.org
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