Expert Q&A: Aeroflow Health’s Kyle Trivedi on the Purpose and Benefits of the Rural Health Transformation Program

As we head toward another year of the Rural Health Transformation Program, which CMS launched in September 2025, we wanted to go a bit deeper on what the program is, what it aims to accomplish, who it benefits, what we can expect from it over time and what it could mean for health plans and their members.

To do this, we sat down with Kyle Trivedi, Regulatory Affairs Lead at Aeroflow Health, who broke it all down for us.

Q: Let’s start with the basics: What is the Rural Health Transformation Program?

Kyle: The Rural Health Transformation Program is a $50 billion federal initiative that was established through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Over the course of five years, starting in 2026, the program’s overall aim is to expand healthcare access, enhance healthcare quality and improve patient health outcomes in rural communities throughout the nation.

Each year, the program makes $10 billion available to the states. Half of that funding is distributed equally among approved states, but the second half is awarded through a competitive application process that takes each state’s healthcare needs and proposed strategies into account before providing that additional funding. Each state’s allocated funds are handled by newly established rural health offices that also play a key role in implementing the proposed improvements to their respective rural healthcare systems.

Q: What are the specific goals of the program?

Kyle: The program’s overall purpose is to meaningfully tackle healthcare challenges that have long encumbered rural healthcare systems, like shortages of medical facilities, healthcare providers and essential tools and resources. It seeks to accomplish this feat through five core goals that all work together to improve rural health outcomes.

The first goal is to Make Rural America Healthy Again. This takes the form of prioritizing preventative care, like the management of chronic diseases, behavioral health, prenatal care and disease prevention.

The second goal is to ensure there is reliable access to healthcare services in rural communities by using the program’s funds to bolster local healthcare facilities to reach the point where they can be depended upon by patients for the long-term future.

The next goal is to use the funds to further develop rural healthcare workforces by recruiting and retaining qualified healthcare professionals. These high-quality professionals will help strengthen patient-provider trust, which leads to better health outcomes throughout the community.

Goal four is to spearhead innovative approaches to care delivery. The program provides incentives for medical professionals to lower healthcare costs for rural patients without sacrificing the quality of care they’re delivering.

The final goal is to adopt new healthcare technologies that’ll modernize rural healthcare facilities for the benefit of both patients and providers. These technology upgrades could improve things like facility efficiency, patient-provider communication services and access to services and care, all of which have major community health outcome benefits.

Q: What tangible impacts will The Rural Health Transformation Program have on patients in rural communities?

Kyle: There’s so much potential for patients in these rural communities to see tangible impacts from the program in their lives. The biggest one is probably the expanded access to essential healthcare services or resources that might not have been available before or were prohibitively difficult to obtain. Patients might see improved access to certain specialists or telehealth services that let them get the expert medical input they need without having to travel long distances. Expanded access alone could bring about life changing benefits to people that otherwise might not have sought out medical services at all.

Looking at long-term patient benefits, the program’s focus on preventative care could also be lifesaving for many, especially for anyone dealing with chronic health conditions or mental health struggles. Concerted, preventative care can help curb these health issues before they grow into larger, more severe problems.

Remember, states have to “compete” for a portion of the program’s funding every year, which means local health systems and initiatives are incentivized to constantly adapt to the needs of their local patient population. So, as the years progress, the program could lead to even more fruitful results for patients, especially those in high-need areas with larger rural populations that have an even greater demand for improved healthcare infrastructure.

Q: What role does Aeroflow Health play in helping states achieve the goals laid out by this program?

Kyle: The team here at Aeroflow Health is very well-positioned to help states reach the program’s goals. We already have countless existing relationships with patients in underserved communities; we just need to continue building upon them. Right now, we serve 50% of mothers living in maternal health deserts by providing breast pumps and resupply services. This starts us off with a very solid foundation to expand and build upon to reach even more mothers in these communities in need of other forms of support, like virtual doula services, virtual lactation education and breastfeeding support, virtual medical nutrition therapy, maternal mental health support and Social Determinants of Health Screenings.

As the program continues ramping up, and states like North Carolina, where we are headquartered, organize their healthcare networks around major hospital systems that act as hubs, our team will have opportunities to partner with them to provide virtual and ancillary care services. This puts us right in the thick of the situation, allowing us to play an active role in addressing some of these critical gaps in rural maternal healthcare, and improve the health outcomes for mothers and families throughout these communities.

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