Adventist Health Tillamook has been honored with the 2025 Oregon Rural Health Excellence Award by Oregon Office of Rural Health, recognizing outstanding innovation and commitment to improving access to care in rural communities.
The award celebrates Adventist Health Tillamook’s Community-Based Nursing Services program, an innovative nurse-led model that brings healthcare directly to underserved and high-risk patients across Tillamook and Columbia counties.
The program redefines rural health delivery by providing care wherever patients are — whether at home, in temporary housing or on the streets. Registered nurses serve as health coaches, trust builders and care navigators, helping patients manage chronic illnesses, access medications and connect with essential community resources.
Supported by a $1.3 million grant from American Nurses Foundation’s Reimagining Nursing Initiative and developed in collaboration with Oregon Health and Science University School of Nursing, the program demonstrates statistically significant improvements in medication adherence, chronic disease outcomes and patient engagement. Since launching its pilot phase in December 2023, the program has served more than 100 patients and is active in six rural clinics, supported by a toolkit in development to promote statewide adoption.
Eric Swanson, Adventist Health Tillamook president, expressed his gratitude for the teams making this achievement possible. “This recognition truly belongs to our community-based nurses, whose compassion and dedication have reimagined what rural care can look like,” Swanson said. “We are deeply grateful to our recently retired executive, Gina Seufert, who led this work with vision and heart, our academic partners at OHSU and American Nurses Foundation, whose grant made this innovation possible. When we combine innovation with state support and community collaboration, we break down barriers of care, giving us real hope for the future of rural healthcare.”
Adventist Health Tillamook’s CBNS program is now seen as a replicable and sustainable model for rural healthcare delivery, supported by new state legislation (HB 2789) passed into law last May that enables reimbursement for nurse-led community care.
The Oregon Rural Health Excellence Award recognizes hospitals, clinics, EMS agencies and community-based organizations demonstrating exceptional creativity, teamwork and resourcefulness in improving health outcomes across rural Oregon. The 2025 awardees were honored on Oct. 2, 2025 at the 42nd Oregon Rural Health Conference in Bend.
