More than a dozen Williamston residents interviewed for this story blamed the Martin County Board of Commissioners for failing to prevent the troubled hospital from closing.

Last month, Williamston resident Verna Perry told commissioners that her sister made a 25-minute drive to the closest hospital only to find out she would not be able to get the treatment she needed there.

“Do you really care, commissioners?” Perry asked. “If you cared, you would do something to get us a hospital here.”

Kaitlyn Paxton was seeking treatment for her asthma at Martin General Hospital’s emergency room the day it shut down. She watched staff wheel out patients on stretchers to transfer them to other hospitals.

Since then, she’s had a hard time finding primary care doctors and specialists to replace the ones who left once the hospital closed.

“As far as everyday doctors and appointments, from my personal experience it has been a nightmare trying to find someone,” she said.

She’s used the federally qualified health center, called Agape Health, which is one of a few facilities in the county still offering primary care. More than a thousand of these health centers operate across the U.S. They receive federal government funds and take patients on a sliding pay scale, regardless of their insurance status or ability to pay.

Agape Health added Saturday hours because of an influx of new patients after Martin General closed, said clinic CEO Dr. Michael McDuffie. Last month, Agape reopened one of the orthopedic clinics that shut down along with the hospital.

McDuffie wants to reopen Martin General next, even if just as a stand-alone emergency room.

“It could mean life or death,” McDuffie said. “They need an emergency department here so that it could at least stabilize them.”

The county, which still owns the hospital and land, is consulting with state officials and federal Health and Human Services agency representatives to determine whether the facility can reopen as a Rural Emergency Hospital, said interim County Manager Ben Eisner. Gov. Roy Cooper helped to usher in a new state law that allows North Carolina’s rural hospitals to make the transition.

The Rural Emergency Hospital program was developed by Congress, signed into law by Trump and finetuned by the Biden administration. The designation allows rural hospitals to unlock millions of federal dollars and beef up Medicare payments if they stay open to provide 24/7 emergency care.

“The simple question we’re trying to answer is how do we go from closed to open in a way that makes sense for the citizens of Martin County,” Eisner said.

If successful, Martin County would be the first hospital in the country to reopen its doors after closing with the new federal designation.

“It’s a top priority for us, we live it every day as a community,” Paxton said of getting the hospital reopened. It’ll be top of mind for her when she votes in the presidential election this fall.

Even still, she said: “I do not think it is a top priority for any of them at all – president, senators – any of them.”

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