News

Our financial performance in the last fiscal year, which ended on Sept 30, 2024, made it clear that we needed to make changes to ensure our future economic health.

We recently met with the Green Mountain Care Board, Agency of Human Services, and Rural Health Redesign Center to review our FY 2024 performance and discuss our mitigation plan for FY 2025. I am happy to report that, with the changes below, we are seeing dramatic improvements eight months into this fiscal year.

Our FY 2025 plan included five key drivers:

1. Stringently control expenses and search for operational efficiency. This took on many forms, including an intensive due diligence process that led us to move our group purchasing agreement from Dartmouth to the New England Collaborative. We also combined or consolidated select roles and scrutinized the need for every open position. We eliminated the need for all traveler and contract staff in nursing and imaging, which was a huge savings.We also now have a centralized contract approval and negotiation process, which helps us be as diligent as possible to get the best price for contracted services.
2. Increase swing bed volume. Grace Cottage’s Swing Bed Program serves a unique purpose that is greatly needed in our area. It’s designed to help patients regain mobility, strength, and independence while also managing hospital-level medical needs such as IV antibiotics, wound care management etc. We have streamlined our referral process and expanded our criteria for accepting certain patients. For instance, we are now able to accept certain dialysis patients or those who have complex wound care needs. We are also very excited to report that we now employ a part-time speech and language therapist who will help us expand our inpatient and outpatient services. We are very proud of the high quality of care we provide which is paramount in ensuring our patients recover and are discharged successfully to their homes.
3. Increase clinic volume. We have made huge progress in primary care volume, with May being one of the busiest months on record for primary care at Grace Cottage. There is a vast community need for primary care availability, and our ability to see more patients is crucial.
4. Partner where possible. To ensure we meet community needs, we are also focused on partnerships and working with our community members while maintaining our independence. We are working closely with Brattleboro Memorial Hospital and have submitted a federal grant application to expand BMH’s “mobile integrated health” services to include our patients. We are also working closely with Dartmouth Health to maintain an understanding of bed availability in the DH network and reinforcing our ability to accept their swing patients and certain acute-to-acute transfers. And as mentioned above, we have joined the New England Collaborative, which includes hospitals in Vermont that are vested in working together whenever and wherever possible.
5. Show our work. Finally, we are committed to showing our excellent work. For several years running, we have enjoyed a clean sweep of the healthcare categories in the Brattleboro Reformer’s Readers’ Choice Awards (see more about that below). This year, we were awarded a prestigious 4-star rating by the National Rural Rating System through the National Rural Health Association, which recognizes excellence in rural healthcare (we were the only hospital in the Northeast to be awarded!). We are also submitting data for the American Heart Association’s “Get with the Guidelines,” tailored for rural health providers. We know that the care we provide is excellent, and these awards prove it!

For two decades, the Brattleboro Reformer has conducted a poll to determine “The best of the best of Windham County.”  Last year, for the eighth year in a row (thanks to the votes we received from  patients, employees, and our community), Grace Cottage Family Health & Hospital won:

• Best Hospital
• Best Emergency Care
• Best Physical Therapy
• Best Place To Work
• Best Pediatrician
• Best Doctor
• Best Pharmacy (Messenger Valley Pharmacy)

We hope you’ll take a minute or two to vote for your favorites in each category (a minimum of 10 votes) before the deadline on Monday, July 7th!
Each individual can complete one ballot online (here) and one print ballot (found in the newspaper). Please help us spread the word by sharing this with friends, family, and neighbors!

Once again, we won the Governor’s Excellence in Worksite Wellness Award at the Gold Level! This award creates a standard of excellence for worksite wellness initiatives and recognizes Grace Cottage’s efforts to bolster a healthy environment and improve employee well-being.

It was a very busy legislative session in Montpelier, and I’d like to highlight two bills that impact Grace Cottage. They are linked below.

The first, H 482, greatly expands the Green Mountain Care Board’s power. It allows the GMCB to change hospitals’ reimbursement rates if certain criteria are met. It also allows the board to assign an independent observer as a “monitor” if a hospital is noncompliant with budget orders.

The second, S 126, requires the GMCB to enact reference-based pricing for FY 2027, and then move to global budgets by FY 2030. The bill also says hospitals must cut 2.5% of their budgets in FY 2026.
We continue to look for ways to trim our already lean budget and are so grateful to our community for your generous donations. We will keep you updated as we learn more about the plan for the reference-based pricing rollout.

The Vermont Agency of Human Services (AHS) is now in charge of transforming health care in our state. They engaged the Rural Health Redesign Center (RHRC) earlier this year to address Vermont’s health care costs and access to care. On Monday, June 9, hospital leadership from southern Vermont met in Woodstock to discuss essential services. We will continue to work closely with RHRC, Green Mountain Care Board, AHS and our other hospital counterparts as we embark on state-wide change initiatives.

I recently returned from a quick two-day trip to Washington DC as an invited participant in National Rural Health Association’s (NRHA) “Rural Hospital Issue Group.” This meeting was very informative and included a handful of rural hospital CEOs, technical experts, rural health research center representatives, federal policy analysts, and directors from USDA, rural health offices and NRHA lobbyists.

My top line takeaway from this time was that, although it is a tumultuous time in healthcare, we are doing the right things here at Grace Cottage. We are prioritizing network and partnerships. We are staying flexible and adapting to changes including federal reorganizations and reporting requirements etc. We are staying abreast of policy changes and anticipated impacts. We are participating in these conversations at the state and federal level to ensure our voice is heard and that we have the most up-to-date information for planning. As federal policy continues to take shape, we will update everyone.

Please plan to join us on the Townshend Common from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. for the 75^th Annual Hospital Fair Day! Free parking, free admission, pony rides, Specialty Booths, Auction, food galore, entertainment, a Hole-in-One contest sponsored by M&T Bank, a Birthday Parade with a stork and bagpipers, and so much more. Come find out why so many people plan their family reunions for the first weekend in August, so that Hospital Fair Day can be part of the fun!

If you have items to donate for Hospital Fair Day, including books, jewelry, art, a car, a boat, antiques, or household items, or if you’d be interested in volunteering for an hour, a day, or more (before, during or after) contact Fair Day co-chairs Connie Holt and Helen Holt at gracecottagefair@gmail.com, or the Grace Cottage Foundation team at info@gracecottage.org.<