Fraud worsens rural hospital void

Access to medical care has long been a dilemma for rural Americans. In some pockets of Texas, the problem has grown even worse after a doctor’s Medicaid and Medicare fraud scheme decimated a chain of rural medical centers that provided health care not easily found for hundreds of miles.

The sentencing this week of Dr. Tariq Mahmood concludes a legal saga that included the closure of four rural hospitals he operated. But for the communities now fac- ing a gaping void in medical care, the problems are far from over.

Mahmood, 63, was sentenced Tuesday to 11 years in federal prison after earlier being convicted of submitting more than $1 million in false reimbursement claims. The hospitals at the center of the case took a major financial hit when federal funding was withdrawn after inspectors found substandard patient care and deteriorating conditions at the facilities.

Hospitals in the North Texas communities of Terrell and Grand Saline have closed. In East Texas, the town of Center lost its hospital, as did Whitney, northwest of Waco. Two others were taken over by new owners.

The closures exacerbate the shortage of medical care in some areas of Texas, where 10 rural medical centers have ceased operations in the last two years alone, according to the Texas Organization of Rural and Community Hospitals. Many of these facilities were losing millions of dollars amid a decline in patients and lower federal and state reimbursement rates.