Florida Health Care News & Policy: March 2026 Update

Florida’s health care sector is seeing new moves this week, from a Tallahassee-based firm expanding its policy footprint nationwide to a nonprofit opening a dementia-focused center in Ocala aimed at serving one of North Central Florida’s fastest-growing patient populations.

Sachs Media, the Tallahassee public affairs and communications firm, launched SachsHEALTH, a new division built to help health care and life sciences organizations fight policy battles at both the state and federal level. The timing is deliberate. Health policy in 2026 is being written simultaneously in state capitals and Washington, with governors, legislatures, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and Congress often moving in conflicting directions on the same issues.

Ryan Cohn, Sachs Media’s partner and Chief Strategy Officer, will lead SachsHEALTH while maintaining oversight of the firm’s broader strategy. He was direct about the problem the new division is designed to solve.

“Health care policy and regulation today are shaped in 50 states concurrently. Governors, state Legislatures, CMS, and Congress are all moving on the same issues at the same time, and often in opposite directions,” Cohn said. “SachsHEALTH gives our clients a team that can run real campaigns on each of those fronts at the same time.”

To anchor the new practice, Sachs Media brought in Byron Johnson as vice president of Health. Johnson carries more than two decades of experience in health care communications and public affairs, with recent work at FleishmanHillard and previous campaigns for Pfizer, Philips, Janssen Pharmaceuticals and Humana. His pitch to potential clients leaned on responsiveness over strategy documents.

“After two decades inside health care companies and the agencies that serve them, I know the difference between a firm that hands you a strategy deck and one that picks up the phone when a bill drops in a statehouse at 10 p.m.,” Johnson said.

The launch of SachsHEALTH signals how much has changed in health policy lobbying. Winning a fight in Tallahassee no longer means winning the policy war. Clients facing federal regulatory pressure or multi-state legislative threats need firms capable of running parallel campaigns across multiple arenas, and Florida-based operations are positioning themselves to compete for that business.

Meanwhile, in Marion County, Empath Health cut the ribbon Friday on a new facility designed to address a quieter but equally urgent crisis: the growing number of Floridians living with dementia and the families trying to support them.

The Empath Dementia Education and Care Center opened on the Empath Hospice of Marion County Helen “Mimi” Walker Campus in Ocala. More than 14,000 Marion County residents currently live with dementia, a figure projected to rise as Florida’s population continues to age. The center is designed to serve as a regional hub, bringing care coordination, dementia education and specialized day services together in one location.

Empath Health CEO Jonathan Fleece described the need in terms that go beyond the individual patient.

“Dementia affects not just the individual, but entire families and communities,” Fleece said. “By bringing together care coordination, education and specialized day services in one location, we are creating a resource the region has long needed.”

The opening drew local leaders, health care professionals and state officials, reflecting the level of attention North Central Florida communities are paying to elder care infrastructure. Marion County’s demographic curve mirrors what much of Florida is experiencing. The state has long attracted retirees, and that population is now aging into its most medically intensive years.

The two developments, one a communications firm sharpening its advocacy tools and one a nonprofit building direct care capacity, point to the same underlying pressure. Florida’s health care system is being pulled by rising demand from an aging population while simultaneously navigating a volatile policy environment at both the state and federal levels.

For patients in Ocala, the new Empath center represents something immediate and tangible. For organizations trying to protect their regulatory footing across multiple jurisdictions, SachsHEALTH is betting it can offer something just as concrete. Both responses reflect the complexity of health care in Florida right now, a state with outsized political influence and an increasingly urgent public health burden.