The Flex Monitoring Team conducted a national telephone survey of 500 Critical Access Hospital (CAH) administrators between January and April 2004 to document the program-related experiences of CAHs in order to help shape public policy to improve the effectiveness of the Flex Program and CAHs.

Key Findings:

• Nationally, CAHs reported significant expansions in a wide range of services over the past two years, including inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation, emergency, outpatient surgery, specialty clinic, rural health clinic, radiology, lab, pharmacy, and swing bed services.
• Few CAHs reported discontinuing services over the past two years, with the exception obstetrical and home health services, which were dropped by more than 5% of CAHs.
• Swing bed services have been a large growth area for CAHs over the past two years, and the vast majority of CAHs now provide swing bed services.