MaineHealth Board Poised to Decide on Closing Lincoln Hospital Maternity Unit

Overview

• The MaineHealth Board of Trustees is expected to vote on the unit’s future on Thursday, and system officials say no final decision has been made as the governance review continues.
• MaineHealth cites persistent staffing shortages and a long-term drop in births as the reasons for the review, with the Miles Campus operating with one part-time OB/GYN and two midwives instead of a fuller team.
• MaineHealth estimates closing the unit would raise average travel time to the next labor-and-delivery facility to about 40 minutes, an increase of roughly 18 minutes that would leave Lincoln County without local maternity services.
• Elected officials and community groups have pressed for a delay and offered alternatives, with Gov. Janet Mills asking for a two-year pause and pointing to $190 million in Rural Health Transformation funds as a possible resource.
• The decision comes against a wider trend of rural maternity closures in Maine—about a dozen in the past decade and four in the last two years—and proposals on the table include staff-sharing with nearby hospitals and training other clinicians to provide deliveries.