Alva Review-Courier -

FREDERICK — It's hard for Ralph Washburn to walk through the dark halls of Memorial Hospital.

This is where Washburn was born – in one of the rooms now used for storage, stacked with mattresses and IV poles.

“It feels terrible to see it like this. It used to be full of life,” said Washburn, director of Tillman County Emergency Medical Services, who also oversees many duties at the hospital and an attached community nursing home.

Memorial Hospital stopped offering inpatient treatment and closed its emergency room last March as a result of declining traffic and decreased Medicaid reimbursement r...