{"id":78728,"date":"2025-07-20T19:12:14","date_gmt":"2025-07-20T19:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/78728\/"},"modified":"2025-07-20T19:12:14","modified_gmt":"2025-07-20T19:12:14","slug":"transportation-barriers-impacting-hawai%ca%bbi-rural-health-care-policy-solutions-proposed-maui-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/78728\/","title":{"rendered":"Transportation barriers impacting Hawai\u02bbi rural health care, policy solutions proposed : Maui Now"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>\n<img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"717\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Checkpoint-4-1024x717.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-424001\"\/>File (2023): Ambulance seen on Honoapi\u02bbilani Highway in West Maui. (Credit: Cammy Clark\/Maui Now)<\/p>\n<p>Long ambulance response times, costly and unreliable non-emergency transportation and insufficient insurance coverage for travel-related health care expenses are among the key findings of a new report released by the\u00a0University of\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi\u00a0Rural Health Research and Policy Center\u00a0(UH\u00a0RHRPC).<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Impacts of Transportation and Travel Access on Rural Health in\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi\u201d\u00a0underscores the widespread challenges faced by residents in rural and neighbor island communities when trying to access timely and affordable health care, and offers policy solutions to address barriers.<\/p>\n<p>Although about 30% of\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi\u2019s population lives in rural areas spread across six publicly inhabited islands, most specialty care is located on\u00a0O\u02bbahu. The report found that residents of\u00a0Moloka\u02bbi\u00a0and\u00a0L\u0101na\u02bbi\u00a0routinely face flight delays or cancellations, often missing urgent medical appointments and waiting months for rescheduling.<\/p>\n<p><b>ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW AD<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The report also highlights gaps in insurance coverage, especially for patients who do not qualify for Medicaid, and the high out-of-pocket costs for travel, lodging and food associated with medical visits. Maternal-fetal health services are particularly challenging, with some pregnant patients needing to relocate from neighbor islands to\u00a0O\u02bbahu\u00a0for prenatal and delivery care or risk emergency medevac transport.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cImproving access will require coordinated efforts across healthcare, transportation and policy sectors,\u201d said John Desfor,\u00a0UH\u00a0RHRPC\u00a0policy and data analyst. \u201cWe hope this research will guide meaningful action to improve transportation access for healthcare in rural communities across\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Some of the shared policy options to address these challenges include:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Enhance emergency air and ground ambulance fleets<\/li>\n<li>Support community paramedicine programs and expand primary care teams<\/li>\n<li>Mandate non-emergency medical transportation coverage in Medicare and private\/employer-based insurance in\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi<\/li>\n<li>Establish a grant program for community-based organizations to support housing for maternal-fetal patients relocating for prenatal and delivery care<\/li>\n<li>Support regional health hubs and mobile maternal health clinics in rural areas<\/li>\n<li>Expand interisland flight programs and explore cost-effective and sustainable alternative modes of transportation for health services<\/li>\n<li>Address airline reliability concerns and increase airline competition by leveraging the US Department of Transportation Essential Air Service program<\/li>\n<li>Enable hospitals and clinics to be reimbursed for transportation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW AD<\/b><\/p>\n<p>This project was supported with funding from the\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi\u00a0State Department of Health Office of Primary Care and Rural Health.<\/p>\n<p><b>ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW AD<\/b><b>ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW AD<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The four-part report features a literature review, interviews with 40 stakeholders, policy recommendations and a focused sub-report on maternal-fetal telehealth.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/research.hawaii.edu\/rhrpc\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/23\/2025\/06\/UH-RHRPC-FULL-REPORT-Transportation-Project-June-25-2025-Final.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">See the entire report on the\u00a0UH\u00a0RHRPC\u00a0website<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe appreciate the significant community engagement in this project from start to finish,\u201d said Aimee Grace,\u00a0UH\u00a0RHRPC\u00a0principal investigator and\u00a0UH\u00a0Strategic Health Initiatives director. \u201cMany stakeholders met with our team to share their stories or contribute context and policy ideas. We look forward to working together to share these policy options further.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><b>ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW AD<\/b><\/p>\n<p>The\u00a0Hawai\u02bbi\u00a0Public Health Institute will host a webinar on this project on Aug. 18, 2025, from noon to 1 p.m. To register, click <a href=\"https:\/\/us02web.zoom.us\/webinar\/register\/WN_02KaSKuVS4SstyC6wpfu3A#\/registration\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"File (2023): Ambulance seen on Honoapi\u02bbilani Highway in West Maui. (Credit: Cammy Clark\/Maui Now) Long ambulance response times,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":78729,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[16542,54324,54325,54326,54327,210,1141,1142,54328,54329,54330,54331,54332,54333,52503,54334,54335,54336,67,132,54337,68,54338],"class_list":{"0":"post-78728","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-care","8":"tag-access-to-health-care","9":"tag-aimee-grace","10":"tag-essential-air-service","11":"tag-hawaii-state-department-of-health-office-of-primary-care-and-rural-health","12":"tag-hawaii-public-health-institute","13":"tag-health","14":"tag-health-care","15":"tag-healthcare","16":"tag-john-desfor","17":"tag-lanai-transportation","18":"tag-maui-health-care","19":"tag-maui-news","20":"tag-maui-now","21":"tag-molokai-flight-cancellations","22":"tag-rural-health-care","23":"tag-the-impacts-of-transportation-and-travel-access-on-rural-health-in-hawaii","24":"tag-uh-rhrpc","25":"tag-uh-strategic-health-initiatives","26":"tag-united-states","27":"tag-unitedstates","28":"tag-university-of-hawaii-rural-health-research-and-policy-center","29":"tag-us","30":"tag-us-department-of-transportation"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}