Figuring out how to expand healthcare access in Pennsylvania’s rural communities

By Whitney Downard, Pennsylvania Capital-Star
June 18, 2026

I have a confession: I’m behind on my dental check-ups.

I’m fortunate to have inherited some pretty resilient teeth, but my addiction to sugary, caffeinated beverages really means I should make my oral health a priority.

When I finally called a month ago, after living in the commonwealth for more than seven months, one Harrisburg-area provider told me they could pencil me in for August … of 2027.

This anecdote is far too familiar for anyone trying to schedule a doctor’s appointment these days, no matter where they live. But the staffing crisis is most acute in our rural communities.

Pharmacists take on new duties to fill provider gaps in Pennsylvania

Twenty percent of Pennsylvanians live in a rural area, yet only 10% of doctors and hospitals are located in their communities. The numbers are even worse for dentists, with only 6% practicing outside of the state’s metropolitan and suburban counties.

Name a provider, from the most elite surgeon to the newly minted licensed practical nurse, and you’ll find similar results. Healthcare is the fastest-growing industry, but the supply of highly trained professionals just isn’t keeping up with the demand.

That’s why my ears perked up when, on an introductory rural health call in February, I heard about a plan to shrink those gaps by creating a new provider: Primary Care Medics.

Dr. Mark Stephens, an associate dean at Penn State University’s College of Medicine, is just one person on a team putting together the proposal. He pitched the new certification as a way to extend the reach of primary care doctors into patient homes, with medics making house calls on behalf of the physicians armed with little more than a high-tech tablet.

These providers, partly inspired by Navy hospital corpsmen, would triage some of the low-hanging fruit of primary care: medication management, monitoring or measuring blood sugar and performing physical assessments. Ideally, the medic can touch on some core health focuses outside of primary care, such as: oral health, maternal or reproductive health, behavioral health and aging.

I’ve personally seen how beneficial a home visit from a trained professional can be when I followed a mobile integrated health paramedic in another state during one of my previous jobs. An elderly couple got specialized attention after a bad fall from someone who didn’t just change wound dressings, but who also made sure their home was safe — securing rugs and stairway railings, moving a laundry machine to be more accessible.

In a state like Pennsylvania with one of the country’s oldest populations, little tasks like that can make a world of difference in the quality of one’s life when someone’s trying to age at home, especially in rural communities. Falls and medication mishaps are the primary reasons why someone is admitted to a nursing home.

State buy-in

Alone, the effort might be enough to earn a few stories focused on the process of crafting the curriculum for an entirely new layer of healthcare staff. But what really piqued my interest was the state’s decision to put federal money behind the initiative.

On paper, the hundreds of millions of dollars flowing into Pennsylvania’s coffers over the next five years through the Rural Health Transformation Plan seems almost like an angel investor.

But it comes with some caveats: the Trump Administration is not afraid to abruptly cut off funds if it suspects fraud and has repeatedly vowed to clawback any rural health money spent outside of narrow parameters.

Any state that doesn’t deliver on its application’s proposals risks those consequences. To me, the commitment to spend even $2 million over the program’s course signifies a real confidence in medics to not only get off the ground, but also demonstrate their usefulness in a short period of time.

Thanks to a grant and fellowship through the National Press Club Journalism Institute, funded by the Common Health Coalition, I’ll be able to spend time traveling to the pilot community for a deeper dive into medics, the opportunities they present and where they may fall short. Most importantly, I’ll have the chance to meet people who will benefit from the proposal and share their stories.

I’ll be visiting at least two rural areas later this summer to spend time embedded in the community to really understand what a difference a few more trained professionals might make, and what the need is like in some of the most remote corners of the state.

I want to talk to the overstretched physicians whose retirements would leave their communities without any local providers, the veteran whose hospital corpsman service doesn’t translate to civilian life, and the pregnant mom trying to schedule prenatal care in a maternal care desert bigger than the state of Connecticut.

If that’s you, or if you have something to share about rural healthcare shortages and primary care medics, shoot me an email. I’d love to hear your story.

Your message might even catch me at my upcoming dental appointment.

Pennsylvania Capital-Star is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Pennsylvania Capital-Star maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Tim Lambert for questions: info@penncapital-star.com.