When you buy a car you can read Consumer Reports to find the vehicle with the best safety ratings.
But what ratings can you use to choose between hospitals? How can you find a hospital that reports fewer health-care-associated infections or has better outcomes for heart attack patients?
There are several online resources to help you decide where you want to go for treatment. While these sites can provide useful information, it’s important to talk with your physician before choosing a facility.
PHCQA
The Pennsylvania Health Care Quality Alliance (PHCQA) website shows how the state’s hospitals measure up on four of the most common and costly conditions: heart attacks, heart failure, pneumonia, and health care-associated infections.
PHCQA—a statewide coalition of the Pennsylvania Medical Society, hospitals, insurers, and others—is dedicated to developing a consistent and uniform approach to hospital quality data collection that makes it easier for you to access, understand, and use the data.
Daniel J. Glunk, MD, president-elect of the Pennsylvania Medical Society, is a member of PHCQA’s board and participates on its methods and measures committee, which created the report.
“We want all citizens of the state and their caregivers to have access to information that can help them make better health care decisions,” said Dr. Glunk.
Keep checking the PHCQA website for updates. The report will be updated quarterly, and PHCQA plans to expand the report in the future.
Hospital Compare
Hospital Compare also is another website that shows how hospitals measure up when it comes to heart attacks, heart failure, pneumonia, and health care-associated infections, but this site gets even more specific.
It shows where hospitals stand on 26 criteria, such as whether heart attack patients are given aspirin or pneumonia patients are given oxygen.
You also can check out ratings from other patients on things like communication, pain management, and cleanliness and find out where patients rank a hospital on a scale of 1 to 10 and whether they would recommend it.
PHC4
You can find information on Pennsylvania hospitals and even specific physicians on the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council (PHC4) website.
Using the website’s interactive databases, you can look up how hospitals and physicians performed on hip and knee replacements, heart bypasses, and hospital-acquired infections, as well as the average charge for these procedures.