login
Become a member
Quick Registration
Full Registration Benefits -
Free Homepages for Doctors
Free Homepages for Hospitals
Free Homepages for Medical Conference
Free Homepages for NGO's
Personal Health Record Creation
Access to all Medical Slides
Access to all Jobs & Products Sale
Top-Rated Hospitals Not Always the Best
Hospital quality ratings have become a source of bragging rights for many hospitals, and they receive substantial attention from both the public and media. Two of the most recognized ratings are the U.S. News and World Report's "America's Best Hospitals" and HealthGrades' "America's 50 Best Hospitals." Although patients and caregivers increasingly use these quality ratings to choose hospitals, the relationship between ratings and outcomes remains unclear. This research is the first of its kind that addresses the important question of whether surgical outcomes at the highly rated hospitals are better than surgical outcomes at other hospitals in the United States.
"Both the U.S. News and World Report and HealthGrades quality rating systems are frequently used for hospital marketing. Our study shows that current hospital ratings systems are no better in judging the quality of hospitals than are procedural volumes," according to Nicholas Osborne, MD, Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
"These quality ratings are marketed as a tool to help consumers choose the best hospitals. However, the best hospitals are hard to define," Dr. Osborne said. "Procedural volume may represent a good proxy for hospital quality for some high-risk procedures, but continued research is necessary to develop better measures of surgical quality for the public. One promising approach is the American College of Surgeon's National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (ACS NSQIP), a quality initiative aimed at measuring and improving surgical outcomes. ACS NSQIP uses clinical data from patient charts rather than relying on billing data from insurance claims, as most quality rating efforts do. As national and regional quality initiatives like ACS NSQIP expand and develop, these efforts will provide detailed and robust data to help us measure and improve the surgical quality of participating hospitals."
|
|
|
 Comment & Contribute
|
Medwonders Health Network
- Health News Index
- News Quick Links
| News Categories: |
| » | Report: A Lot of Americans Have No Access to Health Care |
| » | Greece Faces Humanitarian Crisis as Health Care Access Declines in EU, Doctors Group Warns |
| » | HCCI Report Says Rising Prices for Care Responsible for Increased Healthcare Costs for Privately Insured Americans |
| » | Treatment in ED is Based on Children's Insurance Status |
| » | US Spends Most on Healthcare Without Providing Superior Care |
| More Insurance News | |
|
