Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Tuesday announced that Arkansas has received $208.8 million in federal funding to strengthen rural health care in the state.
The award covers the federal fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2026. Funds come from the Rural Health Transformation (RHT) Program, which was established under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
The program is set to distribute a total of $50 billion to states over the next five years. Arkansas submitted its application for $1 billion in total funding on Oct. 31.
Additional awards will be announced in the future.
“Our state went above and beyond in the application process to secure an outsized portion of the funds available through the Rural Health Transformation Program because we know that Arkansas’ smaller communities deserve just as much support as any other region of our state,” Sanders said in a statement. “I’m excited to get to work quickly on Arkansas’ innovative approach to this program and deliver the care our people deserve.”
Arkansas’ application incorporated feedback from stakeholders across the state, including physicians, nurses, pharmacists, hospitals and other health care providers, as well as higher education institutions and community-based non-profits.
Sanders also established an online portal where more than 300 ideas for uses of the funding were submitted from across the state. State lawmakers provided feedback throughout the development of the state’s application.
The state’s application focused on four initiatives:
- Healthy Eating, Active Recreation, and Transformation (HEART), a program focused on improving health outcomes and access to preventative care by creating a coordinated, community-driven approach to nutrition, physical activity, and chronic disease management.
- Promoting Access Coordination and Transformation (PACT), which integrates specialty care, preventative screenings, telehealth, and trauma-ready services into rural communities while fostering locally-driven clinically integrated networks to improve efficiency, data sharing, and regional collaboration.
- Recruitment Innovation Skills and Education for Arkansas (RISE AR), which strengthens the rural healthcare workforce through expanded physician residencies and other clinical training programs, provides incentives to recruit and retain healthcare professionals in rural Arkansas, and provides training to ensure leaders and board members of local hospitals and clinics are prepared for the transformation required in rural healthcare.
- Telehealth Health Monitoring and Response Innovation for Vital Expansion (THRIVE), which will leverage AI to provide coordinated patient records across delivery systems and fund telehealth platforms, technology-enabled monitoring for chronic diseases, such as diabetes and high blood pressure, and the modernization of emergency medical transport and services.
Funding amounts for each specific initiative will be announced at a later date.
About 45% of Arkansans live in rural areas, making it one of the most rural states in the U.S. Thirty of 47 rural hospitals in Arkansas are at risk of closure, with 11 in immediate risk of insolvency, according to the state’s application for funding.
The application said 79% of rural hospitals are operating at a loss on patient services.
Only 25 of 75 Arkansas counties still have labor and delivery units, and rural maternal mortality rates are double urban counterparts.
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