Healthgrades Latest Hospital Ratings Highlight Variations in Outcomes

On Tuesday, Healthgrades released its annual clinical quality scores for hospitals across the U.S., HealthLeaders Media reports (Commins, HealthLeaders Media, 10/20).

The report then compared patient outcomes from care in one-star hospitals with three- and five-star hospitals in 50 key U.S. markets, including four in California.

Details of Report

For the report, Healthgrades analyzed roughly 45 million Medicare hospitalization records for patients at nearly 4,500 short-term, acute care hospitals across the U.S. between 2012 and 2014. For one condition, Healthgrades also used 2011-2013 all-payer state data.

The organization adjusted the mortality and complications outcomes for clinical risk factors and patient demographics. Healthgrades assessed hospitals' performance on quality based on in-hospital complications, in-hospital mortality, and 30-day post-admission mortality (Healthgrades release, 10/20).

Healthgrades then assigned hospitals ratings of one, three or five stars -- for "statistically significantly worse than expected", "as expected" or "statistically significantly better than expected," respectively, for 33 conditions and procedures (Healthgrades report, October 2015).

Comparing Outcomes, Quality

According to the report, patients treated at hospitals that received five-star ratings for a certain procedure had a 65% lower risk of experiencing a complication and a 71% lower risk of dying during their hospital stay compared with those treated at  hospitals that received a one-star rating for the same procedure.

Healthgrades estimated that if all hospitals performed similarly to those that received five stars, more than 222,000 patient lives may have been saved since 2011 (HealthLeaders Media, 10/20).

In California, the report found that:

• 28.8% of patients in the Fresno area received care at hospitals with higher-than-expected mortality or complication rates (Healthgrades Fresno findings, October 2015);
• 12.2% of patients in the Los Angeles area received care at hospitals with higher-than-expected mortality or complication rates (Healthgrades Los Angeles findings, October 2015);
• 5.2% of patients in the San Francisco area received care at hospitals with higher-than-expected mortality or complication rates (Healthgrades San Francisco findings, October 2015); and
• 3.7% of patients in the Sacramento area received care at hospitals with higher-than-expected mortality or complication rates (Healthgrades Sacramento findings, October 2015).