HealthGrades releases annual list of ‘America’s 50 Best Hospitals’

02/25/2009

HealthGrades yesterday released its annual list of “America’s 50 Best Hospitals,” which includes facilities that have ranked among the top 5% of the nation’s hospitals on clinical outcomes measures for at least the past six years across 26 common procedures and conditions. To create the list, researchers from the independent health care ratings organization reviewed more than 110 million hospitalization records that all non-federal U.S. hospitals—nearly 5,000 in total—submitted to CMS between fiscal years 1999 and 2007. After risk-adjusting the data to account for differences in patient populations among hospitals, HealthGrades compared facilities’ mortality and complication rates across the selected procedures and diagnoses, including spinal fusion, coronary bypass surgery and interventional procedures, myocardial infarction, heart failure, pneumonia, sepsis, and stroke, among others. To qualify for inclusion in the analysis, hospitals had to meet minimum thresholds for patient volumes, quality ratings, and the range of services provided. In releasing its 11th annual list—which includes 30 hospitals concentrated in just the four states of California, Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania—HealthGrades said that the top 50 hospitals had achieved mortality and complication rates that were approximately 27% and 8% lower, respectively, than those at all other U.S. hospitals. Examining the 2009 list, the Washington Post notes the omission of “several hospitals…that appear on most lists of the nation’s best,” adding that variation in different organizations’ ranking methodologies ultimately results “in wide variance from one list to the next.” Acknowledging that the exclusion of certain academic medical centers from HealthGrades’ top 50 “always calls into question the validity of this sort of list,” the company’s chief medical officer emphasizes that the HealthGrades list uses “a window based purely on outcomes” for 26 procedures and conditions, adding that many major medical centers’ reputations reflect their expertise across a broad range of specialties, including conditions and procedures beyond the scope of HealthGrades’ analysis (Halsey III, Washington Post, 2/25 [registration required]; HealthGrades release, 2/24). To view the complete “America’s 50 Best Hospitals” list, please visit the HealthGrades website at www.healthgrades.com.