Hill-Burton Act
The Hill-Burton Act is a 1946 U.S. federal law that funded hospital and healthcare facility construction in exchange for obligations to provide a volume of free or reduced-cost care and serve all community members, shaping facility access for decades.
What is the Hill-Burton Act?
The Hill-Burton Act is a United States federal law enacted in 1946 that provided funding to build and modernize hospitals and other health facilities, particularly in communities that lacked adequate capacity. In exchange for these construction funds, recipient facilities accepted obligations to serve their communities.
Those obligations included providing a defined volume of free or reduced-cost care to people unable to pay, and making services available to all residents of the surrounding area without discrimination. These commitments attached to facilities that took the funding and persisted for years afterward.
Why does the Hill-Burton Act matter?
The law substantially shaped the physical landscape of American healthcare, funding a wave of facility construction that expanded access in underserved and rural areas for decades. Its community-service and uncompensated-care requirements also helped establish expectations about facilities' obligations to the public.
Although it is historical in origin, the Act's legacy persists in how facility access and charity-care duties are understood today. Care-setting and facility planning still operate in an environment shaped by the access patterns this funding created.
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