ATLANTA — Windham Brannon, a recognized leader in providing assurance, tax, and advisory services to clients both nationally and globally, recently donated $140,000 to rural Georgia hospitals through the Georgia Rural Hospital Tax Program (Georgia HEART).

Fourteen hospitals, including Colquitt Regional Medical Center, were awarded $10,000 each from this donation, according to a press release from Windham Brannon. The funds were designated to specifically help rural facilities around the state.

In addition to Colquitt Regional, hospitals receiving funds include AdventHealth Murray (Murray Medical Center), Crisp Regional Hospital, Elbert Memorial Hospital, Floyd Polk Medical Center, Hospital Authority of Miller County, Jefferson Hospital, John D. Archbold Memorial Hospital, Monroe County Hospital, Morgan Medical Center in Madison, Ga., Stephens County Hospital, Tift Regional Medical Center, Union General Hospital and Upson Regional Medical Center, the press release said.

“There’s no doubt rural hospitals play a critical role in the community,” said Danielle Epps, healthcare practice co-leader at Windham Brannon. “Many counties do not have a physician on hand and patients with emergent situations are forced to either wait on an ambulance or drive an hour or more to the nearest healthcare facility.”

“Georgia has about 60 rural hospitals and each one is a vital infrastructure to the state’s well-being,” Epps said. “Communities need their hospitals to remain in business.”

Access to healthcare in rural areas is dependent on the financial well-being of hospitals. To help, Windham Brannon’s healthcare advisors work with rural hospitals to discover revenue leakage and identify process inefficiencies that cause financial impairment.

Revenue leakage, which stems from things like manual processes, not capturing and billing all services, coding errors, and much more, can reduce a hospital’s revenue by up to 10% annually, the company said. Add to that the negative impacts of COVID-19 and the financial losses are sizeable.

“We aim to make a difference for healthcare providers through our financial operations expertise,” said Epps. “We’re honored to be able to help these facilities in a small part through our donation to Georgia HEART.”