DES MOINES, Iowa -- Many of Iowa's smallest hospitals are struggling financially, even in the midst of the nation's largest medical crisis.
"When elective surgeries and procedures were stopped--that's a big source of how those hospitals make revenue. Due to that, they were very tight and many hospitals were getting hold of IHA saying they only had four to six weeks left to pay their employees before they ran out of money" says Iowa Hospital Association Vice President Jennifer Nutt.
She says financial help from the federal CARES Act helped fill the gap, but many of the state's 118 hospitals are still hurting--especially in rural areas.
Nutt says just two weeks ago, many of those rural hospitals were less than half-full.
She also says the IHA is are urging patients not to forgo their regular medical care for fear of seeing doctors, or that hospitals aren't safe during the outbreak.
"They need to have their blood pressure checked, their cholesterol checked. If they have heart disease or diabetes, they need to stay on top of those things, otherwise a few months from now we're going to have a different surge of patients not getting their regular care" Nutt says.
Nutt says a vast majority of Iowa's hospitals are so-called "critical access" facilities in rural areas that typically have 25 beds or less.