President's Message

Posted on: 7/12/24

This week, I had the opportunity to spend some time with Corie Kaiser from the Oklahoma Office of Rural Health, and OHA board member, Trent Bourland. 

We had a robust conversation about how OHA and the Office of Rural Health can collaborate more together in support of our rural communities, and more importantly, addressing the needs of our Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs). We were all surprised to learn that in Oklahoma, we have eight rural counties that are defined by Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) as frontier counties. To be defined frontier, your county must have less than six people per square mile, and of the eight frontier counties in our state, seven are served by Critical Access Hospitals.

OHA has long supported our Critical Access Hospitals and even this legislative session, we fought to extend the Medicaid rate floor to ensure our Critical Access Hospitals will have enough time to fully adjust to Medicaid’s transition to manage care.

Providing access and resources to our smallest communities and our Critical Access Hospitals is just one way OHA responds to member needs. 

A new and unique way in which the association is responding to members’ needs, and perhaps more importantly, in support of our smaller facilities, is the creation of our cybersecurity insurance captive. 

Led by OHA and INSURICA, the captive includes the states of Oklahoma, Texas and New Mexico. In this week’s hotline you will see information on how your organization, with a few clicks, can begin enjoying the benefits of this insurance solution.  

We are branding our program FourTrust91, a cyber protection program designed to strengthen the healthcare system against cyber criminals.

Many of our members showed initial interest in the captive as well as hospitals in Texas and New Mexico. Now that the program has been launched, you can take the opportunity to start the process for your organization to become owners of the first cybersecurity captive in the nation.

Collaborating with the state Office of Rural Health or providing solutions to help improve operational and financial efficiencies like FourTrust91, are just two examples of how OHA is serving the membership to improve health and healthcare in Oklahoma.

Rich Rasmussen
President & CEO