When Lyft As driver Tramaine Carr transports seniors and sick patients to Atlanta hospitals, she feels like both a friend and a social worker.
“If the drive is an hour or an hour and a half and it’s mostly on the highway, people tend to tell you what they’re going through,” she said.
Drivers like Carr have become an important part of the medical transportation system in and around Georgia Washington, D.C, Mississippi, Arizonaand elsewhere. While some patients use transportation companies that focus exclusively on medical rides or non-emergency ambulance rides to get to their appointments, San Francisco-based ride-hailing companies are Above and Lyft also transport people to emergency rooms, kidney dialysis, cancer treatment, physical therapy and other medical visits.
But Georgia ride-hailing drivers don’t just serve patients who live in Atlanta or the sprawling suburbs. When rural Georgia residents are too sick to drive, Uber or Lyft are often one of the only ways to reach medical care in the state capital.
Closure of rural hospitals in Georgia have resulted in people battling cancer and other serious illnesses now having to commute two or more hours to treatment facilities in Atlanta, said Bryan Miller, director of mental health support services at Atlanta Cancer Care Foundationan offshoot of a medical practice aimed at reducing the financial burden on cancer patients and their families.
From April 2022 to April 2024, Lyft drivers completed thousands of trips longer than 50 miles each way that began or ended at Atlanta-area medical treatment centers, including Emory University’s Winship Cancer Institute and Emory University Hospital Midtown Lyft .
While 75% of those trips were less than 100 miles, the company said 21% were between 100 and 200 miles and 4% were more than 200 miles, showing that even Georgians who live just a few hours from metro Atlanta , rely on the ride-hail platform to access medical care.
Uber Health global head Zachary Clark declined to provide comparable ridership figures. Uber Health is a division of Uber that arranges medical transportation for some Medicaid and Medicare recipients, medical personnel, prescription drug delivery, and others who seek reimbursement for medical-related Uber rides. according to Uber’s website.
Lyft also has a healthcare division that offers programs such as Lyft Assisted and Lyft Concierge to coordinate rides for patients.
Nationwide, some insurance companies and cancer treatment centers, as well as Medicare Advantage and state Medicaid plans, pay for such ride-sharing services, often with the goal of reducing missed appointments, they say Krisda Chaiyachatiadjunct assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
In 2024, 36% of individual Medicare Advantage plans and 88% of special needs plans offered transportation services, it said Jeannie Fuglesten Biniekdeputy director for Medicare policy at KFF, the health policy research, survey and news organization that includes KFF Health News. A special needs plan provides additional benefits to Medicare recipients who have serious and chronic illnesses, certain other health needs, or who also have Medicaid.
And Medicaid — the state government’s safety net insurance plan for people with low incomes or disabilities — paid up to 4 million beneficiaries Non-emergency medical transportation services are expected to be used annually from 2018 to 2021, according to a Department of Health and Human Services report. Patients living in rural areas were the most likely to use ride-hailing and other non-emergency transportation providers, according to the report.
The estimated total federal and state investment in non-emergency medical transportation was approximately $5 billion in 2019. according to a studyfrom the Texas A&M University Transportation Institute.
Even when some insurance companies cover rides or charities offer ride credits, social workers say many sick patients are still left without a ride. In 2022, 21% of adults nationwide without access to a vehicle or public transportation went without needed medical care. according to a study from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. People who did not have access to a vehicle but had access to public transportation were less likely to miss needed care.
The data analysis company Geotab classified Atlanta as a draw When it comes to public transport accessibility, it is the second worst country in the country.
“The ability to get to a doctor’s appointment can be a barrier to care,” said Rochelle Schube, leader of a cancer support group in Atlanta. “If I give a patient $250 in Uber cards and they live far away, the money is spent quickly.”
The fact that Uber and Lyft are harder to get in rural America compounds the lack of medical access in these areas. “When you move to rural areas – which you could argue have a higher need – you see fewer services,” Chaiyachati said.
Finding drivers capable and willing to provide medical transport can be challenging. The Atlanta-based start-up MedTrans Go connects patients and healthcare providers with verified drivers, many of whom provide wheelchair or stretcher rides in Georgia and 16 other states. Many of its drivers have medical training, accompany patients to and from medical facilities or their homes and can handle complex situations for at-risk patients, said Dana Weeks, the company’s co-founder and CEO.
The company’s app can also route patients who don’t need specialized assistance directly to Uber or Lyft, she said.
Uber and Lyft rides can save patients and insurers money and cost a fraction of the typical fee for an ambulance ride, he said David Sluskyan economics professor at the University of Kansas who has studiedthe impact of transportation services on medicine.
But instead it was argued Timothy Crimminsa Georgia State University history professor emeritus and former director of the school’s Neighborhood Research Center, would be the best fit Georgia is expanding Medicaidso that more rural hospitals could remain open and Georgians could receive health care closer to home.
Georgia lawmakers’ decision not to accept a state-funded expansion of Medicaid has left more than 1.4 million Georgians without health insurance. according to KFF – and that hurts rural hospitals when these patients use the medical facilities and can’t pay their bills. In Georgia, 10 rural hospitals have either closed or ceased inpatient care operations since 2010, according to a Report 2024 by health advisor Chartis, and 18 others are at risk of closure.
Until more patients are insured, Crimmins said, the state should subsidize Uber and Lyft rides for less affluent Georgians who need help getting to medical care in Atlanta. “Maybe we’re talking about $100 to $150 round trip,” he said. “You can subsidize that.”
However, transporting patients is not for everyone. Damian Durand said his Chevrolet Equinox SUV is large enough to accommodate a medical passenger who needs a wheelchair, but he doesn’t get charged extra to transport people with medical needs. He said some of his recent passengers in Atlanta were Medicaid recipients with mental illnesses or disabilities.
“It can be stressful,” he said. “I feel like Uber and Lyft are trying to surprise me. If I see the trip is going to the hospital, I try to avoid or cancel the trip.”
While Durand’s experiences with medical transport have been mostly negative, Carr loves the work and appreciates being able to help older Georgians, who she said often give good tips. For them, ridesharing remains a good option, even if it involves doctor visits.
“It’s not stressful for me,” she said. “I worked in customer service for a good 20 years. For me, human connection is important. I tried working from home but I really didn’t like it. I prefer this because I can connect with people.”
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism on health issues and is one of KFF’s core operating programs – an independent source of health policy research, polling and journalism. Find out more about KFF.