Product Description

The 2026 Comprehensive Accreditation Manual for Critical Access Hospitals (CAMCAH) features the official Joint Commission standards, elements of performance (EPs), National Performance Goals, and other accreditation requirements, including those for the optional Primary Care Medical Home certification. New for this year:

• Revised standards that use language drawn from federal regulation to more directly identify alignment with US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Conditions of Participation (CoPs)—resulting in a reduction of nearly 650 EPs
• A new “National Performance Goals” (NPG) chapter that consolidates all remaining requirements into salient, measurable topics with defined goals
• A new “Physical Environment” (PE) chapter that replaces the “Environment of Care” (EC) and “Life Safety” (LS) chapters to match the structure of the CoPs

It is organized as follows:

• “Gold tab” standards requirements, including ALL standards, EPs, National Performance Goals, and Accreditation Participation Requirements effective January 1, 2026
• “Blue tab” accreditation process information about Joint Commission policies and procedures and practical survey preparation information on the Early Survey Policy, documentation requirements, standards applicability, and more

The CAMCAH also featuresicons to help navigate documentation requirements, integrated regulatory requirements for deemed status, and a “What’s New” summary of changes made since the previous edition.

Please note: The CAMCAH is published annually. The most up-to-date standards throughout 2026 are available digitally on E-dition^®, found on your Joint Commission Connect^® extranet site or available for purchase here.

Setting: Critical access hospitals. A critical access hospital is defined by CMS as a hospital that offers limited services and is located more than 35 miles from a hospital or another critical access hospital or is certified by the state as being a necessary provider of health care services to residents in the area. It maintains no more than 25 beds that could be used for inpatient care.

Key Audience: Staff responsible for accreditation, compliance, patient safety, or quality improvement in critical access hospitals or the distinct part psychiatric and/or rehabilitation distinct part units within a critical access hospital 

If you need this manual in digital format, get the e-book version of the 2026 CAMCAH. Choose E-book or Site License in the drop-down menu for Book Format above. Site licenses are for sharing the content with others on your team.

Table of Contents

Click on the Table of Contents below for details.
Table of Contents

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