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 The report - by the nonprofit Leapfrog Group, a patient-safety
organization supported by large employers, and Castlight Health Inc,
which sells software for employers to manage healthcare spending -
shows that choice of hospital "can mean the difference between life
and death," said Leapfrog's Erica Mobley.
Rating hospitals has become somewhat of a free-for-all, with
competing groups using different data and definitions of quality.
Only 10 percent of the 844 hospitals rated highest by one rater were
equally rated by even one of the others, found a study this month in
Health Affairs.
"But when it comes to major surgery, it's hard to think of an
outcome more important than whether you live or die," said health
policy professor Dr. Ashish Jha of the Harvard School of Public
Health, who was not involved in the Leapfrog report. "It's amazing
there is such variability in mortality from these common surgeries,
and patients should know that."
Leapfrog asked 1,500 hospitals for 2013 data on four risky
surgeries, including number of procedures and patient deaths. It
adjusted the numbers to come up with a "predicted survival" estimate
for each.
For pancreatectomy (removing all or part of the pancreas, usually to
treat cancer), predicted survival rates ranged from 81 percent to
100 percent. Of 487 hospitals reporting data, 203 had rates of at
least 91.3 percent, which Leapfrog chose as the benchmark for
quality.
For esophagectomy (removing all or part of the esophagus), expected
survival ranged from 88 percent to 98 percent. Only 182 of 535
hospitals had rates of at least 91.7 percent.
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For repairs of abdominal aortic aneurysm, survival ranged from 86
percent to 99 percent; 268 of 792 hospitals met the benchmark of
97.3 percent.
For replacing the heart's aortic valve, survival ranged from 92
percent to 97 percent; only 95 of 544 hospitals hit 95.6 percent.
The study didn't analyze which kinds of hospitals - nonprofit or
for-profit, in one region or another - excelled, but in general
those that performed more procedures did best. National stalwarts
such as Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and the Mayo Clinic
in Rochester, Minnesota, aced all four surgeries, but so did Hoag
Memorial in Newport Beach, California, and Morristown Medical Center
in New Jersey.
Ratings are at www.leapfroggroup.org/cp.
(Reporting by Sharon Begley; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
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