Over the past year, more than 134,000 Montanans have lost Medicaid or Healthy Kids coverage. Now–Yellowstone County’s public health department says it’s letting go of more than two dozen staff members in the aftermath of revenue loss from medicaid redetermination.
RiverStone Health in Billings announced Friday afternoon that it’s cutting 29 employees, part of a multi-million dollar shortfall previously filled through Medicaid revenue.
“RiverStone Health has been forced to make some difficult decisions,” President and CEO Jonathan Forte said on Friday.
He said RiverStone has seen a 12 percent drop in the number of its patients enrolled in Medicaid since last year, when the state of Montana began a process of checking the eligibility of every enrolled Medicaid recipient after the end of a COVID-era federal directive that allowed people to stay on Medicaid without having to reapply.
Forte says losses for RiverStone Health equal about $3.2 million in revenue, 6 percent of RiverStone’s total budget.
Forte says 20 of the 29 employees to be cut are within RiverStone’s Federally Qualified Health Center.
“The disproportionate impact is truly happening within the FQHC and the community health center,” said Forte. “Because that’s where the majority of those medicaid patients go for dental, behavioral health or primary care,”
Forte said other factors affecting RiverStone’s budget include higher costs, fewer patients than expected post-COVID and low Medicaid reimbursement rates. He says RiverStone plans to appeal to the state to reconsider rates.
The staff cuts take effect in June, the same month RiverStone Health plans to close its 12-bed inpatient hospice unit, also due to budget issues.
