Overcoming Rural Healthcare Challenges: How Hyndman Health Transformed Its Practice

The complexity of the American healthcare system poses enormous challenges for practices of each type, size, and location. Those situations become still more critical for rural healthcare providers, many of whom lack easy access to the resources available in wealthier urban and suburban areas. Patients in these communities often struggle with the barriers of geographic isolation, limited health care infrastructure, and workforce shortages.

For the clinics themselves, these geographic challenges are often compounded by a severe lack of IT infrastructure. The burden of maintaining expensive, on-premise servers can threaten a small-town clinic’s financial viability, limiting their ability to deliver metropolitan-level care to underserved populations.

Finding a Cloud-Based Solution

Dr. Brian Stratta, Chief Medical Officer at Hyndman Area Health Center, understands these unique barriers. “We’re located in south-central Pennsylvania, in a fairly remote, rural area of the state,” Dr. Stratta noted.

To overcome this isolation and ensure reliable continuity of care, Hyndman made the strategic decision to overhaul its approach to rural healthcare technology by transitioning to the eClinicalWorks cloud EHR. Moving to a comprehensive cloud system eliminated the need for costly on-premise servers, significantly reducing IT overhead and keeping the practice financially stable.

“When we went to the cloud about three or four years ago, speeds improved dramatically,” Dr. Stratta noted. This transition successfully connected their rural providers to a nationwide interoperability network.

Rural Communities Face Greater Challenges

A 2019 study in the Journal of Environmental Health Sciences, for example, noted that “rural communities face higher poverty rates, lower educational attainment, lack of transportation, a higher proportion of elderly individuals, and lack of access to health services.”

As a result, the authors concluded, such communities face “elevated rates of morbidity and mortality and greater percentages of excess deaths from the five leading causes of death including cancer and cardiovascular disease.”

The good news is that today’s healthcare providers have more and better ways than ever before to help connect their patients to high-quality care. The first of those challenges is so fundamental that it can easily be overlooked — helping patients keep their appointments.

Overcoming Geographic Barriers with Telehealth

With a solid cloud foundation in place, Hyndman was equipped to tackle the geographical isolation of its patient base. Telehealth in rural areas is absolutely critical for patients who face a lack of transportation or live far from their providers.

When patients cannot make a physical office visit — because of distance, illness, weather — staff are using healow TeleVisits™ to deliver care remotely. Whether it is a comprehensive follow-up or just a quick check-in, these virtual visits mean a savings of time and more timely access to care.

Reducing Provider Burden with AI

Beyond geographic barriers, rural clinics often face severe workforce shortages, making provider burnout a constant threat. To alleviate this, a key component of Hyndman’s strategy is the use of the Sunoh.ai medical scribe.

This AI-powered tool helps providers achieve better focus during patient encounters and saves them hours of administrative work afterwards. Rather than having to write up clinical notes themselves, they can simply review draft notes created by Sunoh.

“All providers, including myself, are using Sunoh.ai and it has taken off very well,” Dr. Stratta said. He noted that clinical staff have been able to increase the average number of patients they see each day while significantly reducing the hours they spend during evenings and weekends completing clinical documentation.

Connecting to a Nationwide Interoperability Network

Because rural clinics often lack on-site specialists, seamless interoperability is vital for gathering comprehensive health records.

Hyndman is using PRISMA™, the eClinicalWorks health information search engine, to collect patient data from surrounding hospitals. With PRISMA, doctors have a comprehensive view of each patient’s health history before each encounter. “It’s there live when the patient’s there so we can make decisions live,” Dr. Stratta noted.

Achieving Health Equity

By adopting an advanced EHR for rural clinics, Hyndman Area Health Center has conquered its geographic barriers. Their interoperability journey perfectly illustrates the broader industry goal of achieving health equity and eliminating rural healthcare disparities through scalable technology.

Learn more about Hyndman Area Health Center here.

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