The Biden administration has approved Georgia's request for additional Medicaid funding to help expand the state's healthcare workforce, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Dec. 21.
Twenty-one teaching hospitals will split an estimated $500 million per year, possibly for several years, according to the newspaper. Each hospital's allotment will be based on the amount of care it gives to Medicaid patients. The federal government is allowing extra reimbursement if the money is going toward specific goals.
In Georgia, those goals center around staffing. The state aims to add "innovative programs leading to stabilization, development, and diversification of the healthcare workforce," according to its application.
Atlanta-based Emory Healthcare and Springfield, Ill.-based Memorial Health's hospital in Savannah, Ga., plan to use the funds to train clinical staff, hospital executives said in statements obtained by the Journal-Constitution.