Brookings Health Celebrates Decade on Top 100 Rural & Community Hospital List

  • February 19, 2025
Inpatient Care Nurse Madeline Bungarden, RN, checks in with Hospitalist Provider Abbie Entringer, CNP, while Patient Care Tech Olivia Giovannettone answers the phone. Brookings Health System was recently included for the tenth consecutive time by The Chartis Center for Rural Health on the Top 100 Rural & Community Hospitals list which recognizes the top performing rural and community hospitals from across the nation.
Inpatient Care Nurse Madeline Bungarden, RN, checks in with Hospitalist Provider Abbie Entringer, CNP, while Patient Care Tech Olivia Giovannettone answers the phone. Brookings Health System was recently included for the tenth consecutive time by The Chartis Center for Rural Health on the Top 100 Rural & Community Hospitals list which recognizes the top performing rural and community hospitals from across the nation.

For the tenth consecutive year, Brookings Health System has been included by The Chartis Center for Rural Health on the Top 100 Rural & Community Hospitals list. The annual recognition program honors outstanding performance among the nation’s rural hospitals based on the results of the Chartis Rural Hospital Performance INDEX®.

“Since the Top 100 Rural & Community Hospital list was established in 2016, Brookings Health has been honored and recognized as one of the best rural and community hospitals in the nation,” said President and CEO Jason Merkley. “Our consistent performance for the past decade is attributable to our team’s commitment to providing high-quality, compassionate, personalized healthcare for our community.”

Based entirely on publicly available data, the INDEX is the industry’s most comprehensive and objective assessment of rural hospital performance. Utilizing 50 independent indicators, the INDEX assesses performance across eight pillars of performance that span market-, value- and finance-based categories. 

“The Top 100 Rural & Community Hospitals award program elevates the very best performers and helps create a roadmap for those seeking to improve financial and operational performance while continuing to care for the communities they serve,” said Michael Topchik, Executive Director, The Chartis Center for Rural Health. “This is our tenth year recognizing the Top 100 Rural & Community Hospitals and we’re thrilled to be able to celebrate this milestone with this year’s winners.”

The list of this year’s Top 100 Rural & Community Hospitals, as well as the 2025 INDEX methodology, can be found at chartis.com/top-performing-rural-hospitals. More information about Brookings Health System’s care quality can be found at brookingshealth.org/Quality.

About Brookings Health System

Brookings Health System, located in Brookings, South Dakota, includes a 49-bed hospital, the 79-bed The Neighborhoods at Brookview nursing home, Brookhaven Estates senior living apartments, Yorkshire Eye Clinic, and medical clinics in Arlington, White and Volga, South Dakota. It is a non-profit, city-owned facility that offers the community a full range of inpatient, outpatient, emergency and extended care services. Brookings Hospital provides local access to doctors in Brookings and offers robotic da Vinci surgery and Mako robotic-arm assisted procedures, making it one of the premier rural community hospitals in South Dakota. For more information about the services offered at Brookings Health System, please call (605) 696-9000 or visit us on the Web at brookingshealth.org.