Though UCHealth Grandview Hospital in Colorado Springs is among 446 hospitals listed in a recently released report from the consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen as potentially losing solvency under pending changes to the Medicaid system, there is “no intent to ever close” the 57-bed micro hospital near the University Village neighborhood, UCHealth’s Southern Colorado Region President and CEO Lonnie Cramer reiterated Tuesday.

The nonprofit Public Citizen, which says on its website that it is “fighting, suing and organizing against the Trump regime,” used incomplete data, Cramer said after hosting a health care roundtable at Memorial Hospital North with U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat who represents Colorado.

While profit margins have been low at Grandview, an emergency and specialty-care facility, “There is no likelihood of us closing that hospital because of the amount of services and the need at that hospital,” Cramer said. “Luckily, we’re a regional hospital that’s part of a system.”  

He oversees six UCHealth hospitals in southern Colorado; statewide there are 14 acute-care hospitals in the UCHealth network. When one hospital’s revenue decreases, others fill in the gaps, Cramer said.

But the financial challenges hospitals are facing before new Medicaid regulations take effect under President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” or H.R. 1, already are concerning, he and other UCHealth Memorial Hospital officials said at the event.

Congress passed H.R. 1, also known as the Reconciliation Bill, and it became law on July 4, 2025. The act was designed to reduce federal taxes, reduce or increase spending for various federal programs, increase the statutory debt limit by $5 trillion, and otherwise address agencies and programs throughout the federal government.

Medicaid modifications that include work requirements and reapplying annually start rolling out in December and continue for the next two years.

Cramer said uncompensated care from charity cases and bad debt has been rising throughout the UCHealth system and reached $145 million last year for the southern region alone. That’s a $32 million increase over 2024.

System-wide, UCHealth is the largest provider of Medicaid in the state, he said.

Nearly 68% of patients at Memorial Central and Memorial North combined are government payers that include Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare, Cramer said. For Parkview Medical Center, it’s about 76% of patients.

But federal reimbursement for such patients’ charges is nowhere near keeping pace with rising expenses such as hospital pharmaceuticals and supplies, he said.

Speakers told stories of people not seeking care because they are concerned about not being able to afford it and being priced out of health insurance costs.

Bri Makofske, a local psychologist, said her family paid $16,000 last year in medical insurance premiums alone.

“We feel like we’re shoveling money into a system that does not pay,” she said. “Insurance was supposed to be affordable. We’re seeing increases in premiums and costs, and decreases in what we’re paying doctors. This is not about resources, this is about math.”

Leah Broyles spoke of her 12-year-old daughter, Victoria, who was born with a form of spina bifida and is a paraplegic who uses a wheelchair, relies on a tracheotomy tube and ventilator to breathe, and eats through a feeding tube.

Medicaid pays Broyles and her husband to be Victoria’s caregivers around the clock, but Broyles said cuts will reduce their income by 40%.

The couple doesn’t know if they’ll be able to afford their adapted home in Colorado Springs, she said through tears. And Victoria has had 33 surgeries and needs a few more.

“I feel like so many people don’t understand the impact of what primary caregivers do; it would take four full-time registered nurses to do 24/7 what I and my husband do,” she told Hickenlooper.

“We sacrifice everything for our children because we want the world for them, and these cuts are devastating.”

Hickenlooper said he wants to make sure “everyone has a medical home,” where each person can obtain everything from primary and specialty care to routine preventive and emergency care.

Hickenlooper called the cuts to Medicaid “a health care emergency” that’s leading to “collateral damage.” He also pledged to work to “rebuild” some of the cuts that will amount to $900 billion over the next decade.

“I feel like screaming. I think it’s unthinkable we put people through this,” he said. “I still believe there are a lot of good people when tempers die down. The enemy is us; we take responsibility. I’m not going to stop until we have this agreement hammered out and start getting our country back on the right track.”

The reform is necessary and will tighten accountability, said U.S. Rep. Jeff Crank, a Republican who represents Colorado’s 5^th Congressional District.

“H.R. 1 will improve accountability in the Medicaid system by enforcing eligibility requirements while continuing to provide for our nation’s most vulnerable, including pregnant women, children, seniors and individuals with disabilities,” he said in a statement.

The changes also will ensure Medicaid is solvent in the future and “protects benefits for those who truly need them,” Crank said.  

“In addition,” he said, “much of the legislation’s major provisions are phased in during 2027 and 2028, meaning majority of the law’s Medicaid-related provisions have yet to take effect, giving states and providers time to prepare for implementation.”

An obstetrics unit that closed in the Arkansas Valley in 2024 created a “maternal care desert” in that area and means moms and babies are being transported by helicopter or ambulance two hours away to UCHealth Parkview Medical Center in Pueblo or three hours away to UCHealth Memorial in Colorado Springs, said Becca Morelli, OB nurse navigator for UCHealth.

She’s concerned the state’s health care landscape will become more barren and more difficult to rejuvenate. And people will get sicker before obtaining care, Morelli predicts.

Emergency departments will be more crowded and the wait times will be longer, believes Nick Stremble, emergency department manager at UCHealth.

And many patients will be unaware that they’ve lost their insurance or must adhere to new requirements to qualify until Medicaid reform is underway, said Kaylah Bowman, care management medical social worker for UCHealth.