Hospital Rankings

There are also a wide variety of report cards and ratings websites providing different assessments on hospital performance.

As with any report cards or ratings, each must be interpreted in context, and it is unlikely any one report card will provide a robust and reliable portrait of quality in a hospital. For example, some of the data used to calculate hospital grades can be years old, and may not reflect more recent performance improvement efforts. In addition, not all measures apply to all patients, which can matter when report cards are used as the primary tool to select a hospital for a specific procedure. Also, the proliferation of scorecards means that hospitals often receive divergent ratings across different reports, even when the reports are based on some of the same measures.

To promote a more rational approach, the American Hospital Association, along with other national hospital associations, has endorsed a set of principles for quality report cards and rating systems that call for them to:

• Have a clearly stated purpose, with measures selected to fit this purpose;
• Demonstrate transparency by using a scoring methodology that can be replicated by others, clearly identify data sources, and describe limitations of quality scores;
• Demonstrate validity by using statistical methods that are supported by evidence and are field-tested.

Resources

Healthcare Association of New York State (HANYS) Report on Report Cards

Further Reading

Kaiser Health News: Hospitals Ratings are in the Eye of the Beholder

Health Affairs: National Hospital Ratings Systems Share Few Common Scores and May Generate Confusion Instead of Clarity