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Bob Moos: Medicare’s Hospital Compare website rates your local hospital care
The Times - 1/9/2018
Have you wondered how your area hospitals stack up in terms of the quality of care they provide?
Emergencies obviously call for rushing to the nearest hospital. But when you have time to plan, it is worth doing some research and finding out which hospitals do the best job of caring for their patients.
Medicare's Hospital Compare website ? at medicare.gov/hospitalcompare/search.html ? has made it easier for you to check that. The site has overall star ratings to help you better understand which hospitals are top performers, which are average and which need improvement. The ratings range from one to five stars, with five being the best.
The Hospital Compare site enjoys a solid reputation with the public, showing how thousands of hospitals scored on various indicators of quality care. You can compare hospitals on the basis of such factors as clinical outcomes, customer satisfaction and patient safety.
The just-updated overall star ratings offer a snapshot of particular hospitals' quality of care, by summing up individual measures of hospital performance posted on the website. The ratings reflect such factors as how often patients get infections after surgery, how long patients must wait in the emergency department before seeing a doctor or nurse, and how likely patients are to get readmitted to the hospital after a heart attack.
The stars take into account the mix of patients at a hospital, so that those facilities with a high percentage of sicker patients aren't rated lower than those that handle more run-of-the-mill cases.
Medicare assigned stars to 3,692 Medicare-certified hospitals nationwide. Another 887 couldn't be included, mostly because they didn't have enough data to properly evaluate them. They may have been too new or too small and, therefore, had too few cases on which to base ratings. The ratings will be updated regularly on the website, as the government continues to collect the most recent data.
Nationally, 260 hospitals received five stars, 753 rated four stars, 1,187 scored three stars, 1,155 received two stars, and 337 had just one star.
The 56 rated Arkansas hospitals scored an average of 2.8 stars for overall quality of care. Two hospitals ? Arkansas Surgical Hospital in North Little Rock and Crossridge Community Hospital in Wynne - received five stars, 16 rated four stars, 15 scored three stars, 13 received two stars, and 10 had one star.
Here are the scores for all area hospitals:
Jacksonville ? North Metro Medical Center - 1 star
Little Rock ? Arkansas Heart Hospital - 4 stars
Little Rock ? Baptist Health Medical Center-Little Rock - 1 star
Little Rock ? St. Vincent Infirmary - 1 star
Little Rock - UAMS Medical Center - 1 star
North Little Rock ? Arkansas Surgical Hospital ? 5 stars
North Little Rock ? Baptist Health Medical Center North Little Rock ? 2 stars
Other Arkansas hospitals' star ratings can be found at medicare.gov/hospitalcompare/search.html.
By using star ratings on its Compare websites, Medicare is trying to help you make more informed decisions about your health care. The public reporting also gives low-performing providers a compelling incentive to improve their practices and procedures and, hence, their scores.
Nursing Home Compare, Home Health Compare and the Medicare Plan Finder also use star ratings to help you check out health care providers and insurers and choose one with quality in mind.
Of course, as informative as these websites can be, they can't tell the whole story about where to go for care. They're simply a screening tool that lets you focus on a few providers that interest you.
Visit with your doctor about the best hospital for you. Research shows that some hospitals do better than others at treating certain conditions. And talk to family members and friends about what they liked or disliked about their recent hospital stays and which facilities they'd recommend.
Medicare also recently updated its "Guide to Choosing a Hospital," which includes a checklist of questions to ask your doctor and explains how to find the hospital that's the right fit for you. A free copy can be downloaded at medicare.gov or requested by calling Medicare at 1-800-633-4227.
Once you've done your homework, you'll have peace of mind knowing you've made an informed choice about your care. Then you can concentrate on the rest of your preparations for your hospital stay.
Bob Moos is the Southwest regional public affairs officer for the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
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Here's the complete list of the 56 rated Arkansas hospitals; 21 other hospitals were not rated:
Arkadelphia ? Baptist Health Medical Center - Arkadelphia ? 3 stars
Batesville ? White River Medical Center ? 4 stars
Benton ? Saline Memorial Hospital - 2 stars
Berryville ? Mercy Hospital Berryville - 4 stars
Blytheville ? Great River Medical Center ? 1 star
Camden ? Ouachita County Medical Center - 3 stars
Clarksville ? Johnson Regional Medical Center - 3 stars
Clinton ? Ozark Health ? 4 stars
Conway ? Conway Regional Medical Center - 2 stars
Crossett ? Ashley County Medical Center - 3 stars
Danville ? Chambers Memorial Hospital - 4 stars
Dardanelle ? River Valley Medical Center ? 2 stars
El Dorado ? Medical Center South Arkansas - 2 stars
Fayetteville ? Washington Regional Medical Center ? 2 stars
Forrest City ? Forrest City Medical Center - 2 stars
Fort Smith ? Mercy Hospital Fort Smith - 4 stars
Fort Smith ? Sparks Regional Medical Center - 1 star
Gravette ? Ozarks Community Hospital of Gravette ? 4 stars
Harrison ? North Arkansas Regional Medical Center - 4 stars
Heber Springs ? Baptist Health Medical Center Heber Springs ? 4 stars
Helena ? Helena Regional Medical Center ? 2 stars
Hope ? Wadley Regional Medical Center at Hope - 3 stars
Hot Springs ? National Park Medical Center - 2 stars
Hot Springs ? St. Vincent Hospital ? 1 star
Jacksonville ? North Metro Medical Center - 1 star
Jonesboro - NEA Baptist Memorial Hospital - 3 stars
Jonesboro ? St. Bernard's Medical Center - 1 star
Lake Village ? Chicot Memorial Medical Center - 2 stars
Little Rock ? Arkansas Heart Hospital - 4 stars
Little Rock ? Baptist Health Medical Center-Little Rock - 1 star
Little Rock ? St. Vincent Infirmary - 1 star
Little Rock - UAMS Medical Center - 1 star
Magnolia ? Magnolia Hospital - 3 stars
Malvern ? Baptist Health Medical Center-Hot Springs County - 4 stars
Mena ? Mena Regional Health System ? 3 stars
Monticello ? Drew Memorial Hospital ? 3 stars
Mountain Home ? Baxter Regional Medical Center ? 2 stars
Mountain View ? Stone County Medical Center ? 4 stars
Nashville ? Howard Memorial Hospital ? 4 stars
North Little Rock ? Arkansas Surgical Hospital ? 5 stars
North Little Rock ? Baptist Health Medical Center North Little Rock ? 2 stars
Paragould ? Arkansas Methodist Medical Center ? 1 star
Piggott ? Piggott Community Hospital ? 3 stars
Pine Bluff ? Jefferson Regional Medical Center ? 1 star
Pocahontas ? Five Rivers Medical Center ? 4 stars
Rogers ? Mercy Hospital Northwest Arkansas ? 4 stars
Russellville ? St. Mary's Regional Medical Center ? 2 stars
Salem ? Fulton County Hospital ? 3 stars
Searcy ? White County Medical Center ? 3 stars
Sherwood ? St. Vincent Medical Center/North ? 2 stars
Siloam Springs ? Siloam Springs Regional Hospital ? 3 stars
Springdale ? Northwest Medical Center-Springdale ? 3 stars
Stuttgart ? Baptist Health Medical Center-Stuttgart ? 4 stars
Van Buren ? Sparks Medical Center ? Van Buren ? 3 stars
Warren ? Bradley County Medical Center ? 4 stars
Wynne ? Crossridge Community Hospital ? 5 stars