Reeves announces second round funding for Mississippi’s Rural Health Transformation Program

• More than 370 applications were received in the second round, of which nearly 60 projects were approved totaling $32.6 million in funding. The third application period is now open, with a focus on modernizing the electronic health record systems in Mississippi.

Now that the second round of projects for Mississippi’s Rural Health Transformation Program have been approved, applications for the next projects are now being accepted.

Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves (R) announced the newly approved RHTP projects on Wednesday. The awards total $32.6 million in grants for projects focused on workforce development and those providing emergency psychiatric services for mental health treatment. 

The funding is part of the first of five annual awards under the federal government’s Rural Health Transformation Program. This year, Mississippi received a total of $206.5 million. Awards for the next four years will be announced as the program continues through the five-year run.

Projects announced for approval on Wednesday will increase the healthcare workforce through an “earn while you learn” program, outreach efforts to middle and high schoolers, and preceptor expansion efforts. Three grants were also approved to develop EmPATH (Emergency Psychiatric Assessment Treatment and Healing) units across the state.

“This is another really important round of awards,” said Reeves. “The investments we’re making today will help Mississippi train, recruit and retain the health care professionals our rural communities need and help close gaps in mental health care by strengthening our state’s Psychiatric Emergency Services. We set out to transform health care across our state, and that’s what we’re doing.”

In total, the second application period saw 376 applications received, of which about 60 were approved. 

“The Rural Health Transformation Fund continues to transform hospital services and patient care across Mississippi,” U.S. Senator Roger Wicker said. “Through the program, we are improving patient outcomes by recruiting, educating and training a highly skilled health care workforce.”

Projects announced Wednesday include $9 million for the “earn while you learn” program that will connect the education sector directly to employers as they develop workers, along with $6.2 million in 20 workforce recruitment and ecosystem workforce projects to attract healthcare workers to work and stay in rural areas.

Another $3 million will fund 12 preceptor expansion projects to increase the number of experienced healthcare professionals who can train new students and healthcare providers. 

To reach the secondary education sector, $1 million has been allocated for four medical outreach projects geared toward middle and high school students to expose them to potential careers. 

Expansion of access to specialized mental health care for those in crisis will be funded through $13.3 million in EmPATH projects.

“This is what rural health transformation should look like: federal investment that is putting patients first, driving lasting improvements and expanding healthcare for the hardworking Americans who call these communities home,” Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administer Dr. MehMet Oz said.

Next Application Period

Now that the second round of projects have been announced, Governor Reeves said another round of applications is now open.

The next round of projects will aim to remove gaps in rural care and help modernize the electronic health record systems in Mississippi to better connect facilities. The goal is to assist independent rural health care facilities and providers in adopting or upgrading electronic health record systems that will modernize clinical workflows.

Qualifying providers must have 60 or less in-patient beds, 50 or less licensed full time healthcare professionals on staff, and not be owned or controlled by a hospital system, integrated delivery network, FQHC parent network, or similar enterprise.

State Health Officer Dr. Daniel Edney believes one of the most transformative projects in this round of funding for the state will be the establishment of a connected electronic health record system because it will help residents as they seek various care throughout the state. Such a system will be especially beneficial as patients transfer from rural areas to metro centers like Jackson. 

“And at each level that handoff of information has been incredibly difficult before, and now it will be seamless and secure,” Edney explained.

The window for this third round of applications ends November 23, with awards anticipated sometime in February of next year. 

Governor Reeves said it is his hope that a more connected and robust electronic health record exchange will help Mississippi reach the kinds of gains in healthcare it has seen recently in education. 

“For 50 years, Mississippi was ranked 50. Dr. Edney and I have spent years talking about that,” Reeves said. “But two years ago, we were ranked 49th last year, we were ranked 48th [this year]. We’re making progress. Not as fast as I want it to be, but it’s a lot faster than it occurred in 50 years before we started having these conversations.”

Projects Receiving Second Round Funding

Workforce Recruitment and Sustainable Ecosystem Development

1. Tippah County Hospital — Tippah County — $267,954.00 — To recruit and retain a full-time primary care physician.

2. Tate County Hospital — Tate County — $300,000.00 — To recruit and retain a broad range of healthcare professionals needed to sustain essential services and expand access to care in Tate County and the surrounding rural service area.

3. Magnolia Regional Health Center EMS — Alcorn County — $100,000.00 — To implement a non-cash, competency-based recruitment and retention strategy centered on nationally recognized critical care education.

4. Peak Physical Therapy — Jones County — $215,000.00 — To recruit, onboard, and retain two physical therapists and one physical therapist assistant.

5. Natchez Hospital Company LLC, d.b.a. Merit Health Natchez — Adams County — $405,000.00 — To prioritize recruitment of physicians in nine critical specialties: Cardiology, Radiology, Urology, Family Medicine with OB, Family Medicine, OB-GYN, Orthopedic Surgery, Otolaryngology, Pediatrics.

6. Merit Health River Region — Warren County — $263,000.00 — To support four specialty physician searches, rural RN recruitment events, employer-paid nursing certifications, and related workforce recruitment and development activities.

7. South MS State Hospital — Lamar County — $12,000.00 — To purchase simulation equipment that will establish a comprehensive Simulation-Based Clinical Skills Training Initiative.

8. North Mississippi Primary Health Care, Inc. — Tippah and Benton Counties — $489,750.00 — To recruit and retain licensed providers in the three disciplines where its service-area shortages are most severe and best documented.

9. Premier Medical Group of Mississippi, LLC — Attala County — $394,164.00 — To recruit and retain five healthcare professionals who will provide services to patients in rural central Mississippi.

10. MSE Behavioral & Mental Health Services — Lowndes County — $115,000.00 — To recruit and retain one full-time Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW).

11. Mississippi Delta Community College — Sunflower County — $110,000.00 — To purchase a life-sized 3D anatomy visualization and virtual dissection system benefiting rural students pursuing nursing and allied health careers across its seven-county service area.

12. Southeast Mississippi Rural Health Initiative, Inc. — Forrest, Pearl River, Lamar, Perry and Covington Counties — $948,790.00 — To recruit and retain a multidisciplinary healthcare workforce serving rural and underserved communities throughout southeast Mississippi.

13. Progressive Health of Houston — Chickasaw County — $660,500.00 — To recruit and retain rural healthcare professionals.

14. Amite County Medical Services, Inc. — Amite County — $236,449.00 — To target healthcare professionals who are essential to maintaining comprehensive, accessible care for residents of rural Amite and Pike counties.

15. Copiah County Medical Center — Copiah County — $115,741.92 — To recruit and retain Family Medicine physicians. 

16. Delta Health System — Washington County — $145,000.00 — To modernize workforce infrastructure for approximately 647 employees in Greenville and the broader rural Mississippi Delta, particularly nursing, advanced practice, and allied health professionals critical to patient care.

17. Yalobusha General Hospital — Yalobusha County — $95,000.00 — To recruit and retain a full-time physician to stabilize the continuum of care in Yalobusha County.

18. George County Hospital DBA Greene County Hospital — Greene County — $400,000.00 — To recruit and retain mid-level providers.

19. Claiborne County Hospital d/b/a Claiborne County Medical Center — Claiborne County — $783,692.00 — To recruit and retain full-time healthcare professionals in order to maintain continuous hospital operations and access to care.

20. Franklin County Memorial Hospital — Franklin County — $150,000.00 — To support degree advancement, professional certifications, specialty and simulation-based training, cybersecurity, behavioral health, emergency preparedness, and continuing education for clinical, technical, and administrative staff.

Secondary Education Medical Career Outreach

1. Millsaps Career and Technology Center at Starkville High School — Oktibbeha County — $27,835.34 — To expand opportunities for students to explore and prepare for careers in healthcare, while also increasing health education and awareness throughout the community.

2. Mississippi Center for Advancement of Prehospital Medicine — Rankin County — $375,000.00 — To expand EMT education for 100 participants statewide.

3. Grenada School District — Grenada County — $260,000.00 — To implement a hospital-connected rural healthcare career pathway designed to assist secondary students with career awareness and exploration.

4. Behavioral Solutions of Mississippi — Lauderdale and Scott Counties — $350,000.00 — To strengthen the recruitment, training, retention, and deployment of qualified behavioral health professionals while expanding access to services.

Preceptor Expansion

1. Tate County Hospital — Tate County — $50,000.00 — To strengthen the rural healthcare workforce pipeline in Tate County and surrounding rural communities in North Mississippi.

2. Brown Behavioral Health Services — DeSoto County — $448,140.00 — To build durable clinical teaching capacity across North Mississippi.

3. Phyfer Eye Care, PC DBA Brooks Eye Center and Optical — Lowndes County — $13,200.00 — To formally compensate the three optometrists who train fourth-year Doctor of Optometry interns from Southern College of Optometry (SCO).

4. HHH Foundation — Monroe County — $250,000.00 — To increase clinical training capacity, strengthen healthcare workforce pathways, and improve the long-term supply of healthcare professionals serving Aberdeen, Monroe County.

5. Access Family Health Services, Inc. — Lee, Monroe, Itawamba and Chickasaw Counties — $59,650.00 — To create a Preceptor Expansion Initiative designed to strengthen clinical training capacity and create a more sustainable healthcare workforce pipeline in rural northeast Mississippi.

6. Baptist Memorial Hospital-Yazoo, Inc. — Yazoo, Leake, Calhoun, Attala and Scott Counties — $549,440.00 — To increase physician-preceptor capacity and improve access to care.

7. Mississippi Center for Advancement of Prehospital Medicine — Rankin County — $330,000.00 — To expand the clinical and field education capacity required to prepare Mississippi’s future paramedic workforce.

8. Singing River Health System — Jackson County — $180,000.00 — To expand the RN Clinical Coach structure needed to support the M-CARE LPN-to-RN Apprenticeship.

9. University of Mississippi — Lafayette County — $302,479.00 — To recruit, train, certify, and support pharmacists who serve as preceptors in rural and underserved communities across Mississippi.

10. Northeast Mental Health-Mental Retardation Commission d.b.a. LIFECORE Health Group — Lee County — $7,600.00 — To strengthen and sustain the behavioral workforce serving rural northeastern Mississippi. The purpose is to retain and support physician preceptors who provide clinical supervision and mentorship required for advanced practice providers.

11. Progressive Health of Houston — Chickasaw County — $59,484.00 — To transform an experienced but informally structured clinical mentoring environment into a certified, institutionalized rural clinical training program with three core components: preceptor certification, affiliation agreement infrastructure, and rotation hosting.

12. Jones College — Jones County — $770,000.00 — To recruit and train at least 150 multidisciplinary healthcare professionals as preceptors, benefiting students, employers, and rural communities across eight south-central Mississippi counties.

Earn While You Learn

1. Baptist Memorial Hospital-Oktibbeha — Oktibbeha County — $515,000.00 — To implement a coordinated workforce strategy that includes targeted recruitment, enhanced onboarding, credentialing support, professional development, leadership training, retention incentives, and structured career ladders.

2. Helton Family Dental Care, PA — Monroe County — $45,733.38 — To support the education, rural clinical training, credential attainment, and workforce entry of an identified fourth-year Doctor of Dental Medicine (DMD) student.

3. Progressive Health of Houston — Chickasaw County — $72,936.00 — To target two rural healthcare professional populations facing persistent access and financial barriers to workforce entry: Licensed Practical Nurses (LPNs) seeking to advance to Registered Nurse (RN) licensure through an LPN-to-RN bridge program.

4. Jefferson County Nursing Home — Jefferson County — $181,000.00 — To provide approximately 15 underserved rural residents and healthcare workers with paid pathways to CNA, LPN, and RN credentials while addressing severe staffing shortages in southwest Mississippi.

5. Memorial Health System — Harrison County — $219,120.00 — To work with Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College to provide eight participants with a paid pathway into obstetric surgical technology careers while addressing critical workforce shortages across rural and medically underserved coastal Mississippi.

6. East Mississippi Community College — Lowndes and Kemper Counties — $515,257.86 — To launch a high-impact evening and weekend training model for both Practical Nursing (PN) and associate degree Nursing (ADN) programs at the Golden Triangle campus.

7. Kinder Mind — George and Jefferson Counties — $200,000.00 — To provide 10 social work students with stipend-supported training positions to expand the behavioral health workforce serving rural and underserved communities in South Mississippi.

8. Northwest Mississippi Regional Medical Center — Coahoma County — $581,813.70 — To implement a regional Earn While You Learn (EWYL) nursing workforce initiative in partnership with Aaron E. Henry Community Health Services Center, Inc. (AEH), Coahoma Community College and Mississippi Delta Community College.

9. IM&PC — Union and Lee Counties — $182,000.00 — A one-year Earn While You Learn project to support current employees and improve healthcare access across seven rural counties in Northeast Mississippi.

10. Delta Health Transformation Council, Inc. — Washington County — $291,000.00 — To create a regional Earn While You Learn initiative to address persistent healthcare workforce shortages across the rural Mississippi Delta.

11. Itawamba Community College — Itawamba County — $75,000.00 — To remove the cost barrier to entering emergency medical services in rural northeast Mississippi.

12. Singing River Health System — Jackson County — $613,584.80 — To launch a new Registered Nurse (RN) Apprenticeship program to address critical shortages.

13. George County Hospital — George County — $125,000.00 — To train two employed CRNAs in pain management to expand access to specialized services for rural populations across George, Greene and Stone counties.

14. South Central Regional Medical Center — Jones, Simpson, Smith and Covington Counties — $841,500.00 — To target rural residents and incumbent staff across Jones, Simpson, Smith and Covington counties who are pursuing nursing or EMS credentials.

15. Delta State University — Bolivar County — $1,082,488.82 — To strengthen Mississippi’s rural nursing workforce by creating an accessible pathway for students.

16. Forrest County General Hospital — Forrest County — $1,257,560.00 — To establish Mississippi’s first “Care Connection Center,” embedded in its flagship Forrest General Hospital, serving a 19-county area in Southern Mississippi.

17. King’s Daughters Medical Center — Copiah County — $540,000.00 — To create an Earn and Learn Initiative designed to help qualified students remain in healthcare education, complete their credentials, and transition into employment.

18. Northwest Mississippi Regional Medical Center — Coahoma County — $88,358.00 — To implement an Earn While You Learn allied health workforce expansion project in partnership with Singing River Healthcare Academy.

19. Northwest Mississippi Regional Medical Center — Coahoma County — $279,279.50 — To strengthen rural imaging workforce capacity for Clarksdale, Coahoma County and surrounding Mississippi Delta communities.

20. Aaron E. Henry Community Health Services Center, Inc. — Coahoma County — $669,093.00 — To expand a successful Community Health Worker (CHW) training program across rural Mississippi.

21. Delta Health Center, Inc. — Washington County — $674,870.00 — To recruit, train, and employ a Digital CHW workforce for Delta Health Center (DHC).

Psychiatric Emergency Services

1. Merit Health Central/Jackson MHA, LLC — Hinds County — $4,500,000.00 — To establish a dedicated EmPATH (Emergency Psychiatric Assessment, Treatment, and Healing) Unit adjacent to the hospital’s Emergency Department to address Mississippi’s behavioral health service gaps and reduce prolonged ED boarding, unnecessary psychiatric admissions and inappropriate jail placements.

2. Memorial Hospital at Gulfport — Harrison County — $4,496,000.00 — To establish a 12-recliner EmPATH Unit adjacent to the Emergency Department at Memorial Health Gulfport to address South Mississippi’s growing behavioral health crisis needs. 

3. University of Mississippi Medical Center Greenwood Hospital — Leflore County — $4,320,032.00 — To establish a dedicated EmPATH Unit adjacent to the hospital’s Emergency Department to address Mississippi’s behavioral health service gaps.

Other Remarks from Wednesday’s Press Conference with Reeves

Governor Reeves fielded a question on the recent release of body cam footage from the officer-involved shooting from June that resulted in the death of a 1-year-old child at a Walmart parking lot in Senatobia.

Attorney General Lynn Fitch recently announced that her office found the officer’s actions justified.

Reeves said he has not watched the video footage but did say the incident is tragic and asked the state to pray for the family of that child. He did pose a question into why the officer even needed to shoot into the vehicle.

“What loving mother brings their 1-year-old child to commit a crime?” Reeves posited. “Why on Earth was that baby in that car when the driver allegedly tried to run over the cop? It doesn’t make any sense whatsoever, and it’s just awful absolutely awful.” 

Reeves challenged the general public to watch the video footage for themselves and draw their own conclusions.