National Compliance With Community Input on Nonprofit Hospital Community Benefit Activities

Are nonprofit hospitals complying with the federal requirement to solicit and account for written comments from the community (ie, community input requirement) on their community benefit activities, and what approaches do compliant hospitals use to solicit community input?In this nationally representative cross-sectional study of 543 hospitals, 57 (10.5%) were compliant with the Internal Revenue Service requirement to solicit and account for written comments from the community. No significant differences in hospital characteristics were found between compliant and noncompliant hospitals.Poor hospital compliance with the community input requirement raises questions about whether community benefit activities reflect community perspectives and priorities, indicating a need for improved transparency and accountability in community benefit policies.

Corresponding Author: Ashlyn Burns, PhD, Department of Psychiatry, Indiana University School of Medicine, 410 W 10th St, Ste 2000, Indianapolis, IN 46202 (ashbburn@iu.edu).

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