Methodology for the Fortune/PINC AI 100 Top Hospitals 2023

100 Top Hospitals Methodology Overview

To conduct the 100 Top Hospitals study, researchers evaluated 2,644 short-term, acute care, non-federal U.S. hospitals. All research was based on the following public data sets: Medicare cost reports, Medicare Provider Analysis and Review (MEDPAR) data, and core measures and patient satisfaction data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Hospital Compare website. Hospitals do not apply for awards, and winners do not pay to market this honor. For more information, visit http://www.100tophospitals.com/.

Fortune/PINC AI 100 Top Hospitals 2023: Teaching Hospitals

Fortune/PINC AI 100 Top Hospitals 2023: Community Hospitals

Class definition
Each hospital is defined within a class based on their bed size and teaching status.
Major Teaching – 203 Hospitals
Teaching – 632 Hospitals
Large Community – 243 Hospitals
Medium Community – 739 Hospitals
Small Community – 827 Hospitals

Final rank
Final Rank is determined based on performance for all individual measures. Hospitals are ranked within their Class definition group.

Everest Winner Methodology

Winners of the 100 Top Hospitals Everest Award set national benchmarks for both fastest rate of improvement and highest current year performance on the study’s balanced scorecard.

Everest Award winners are selected from among the new 100 Top Hospitals award winners. The national award and the Everest Award are based on a set of ameasures that reflect performance across the whole organization. Our methodology for selecting the Everest Award winners can be summarized in three main steps:

1. Selecting the annual 100 Top Hospitals award winners using our objective methodology based on publicly available data and a balanced scorecard of performance measures using the most current data available (2021 at the time of this study).

2. Using our five-year (2017 -2021) trending methodology to select the 100 hospitals that have shown the fastest, most consistent improvement rates on the same balanced scorecard of performance measures.

3. Identifying those hospitals that ranked in the top 100 on both lists: These 29 hospitals are the Everest Award winners.

Community Health Measure for 2023

For the 2023 100 Top Hospitals Study, we focused on the three components proposed by the Bloomberg American Health Initiative and the Center for Health Equity at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health that would be derived from a hospital survey. The survey focuses on the role that a hospital can play including:

(1) acting as a healthcare provider to provide services critical for community health and offering critical preventive services; (2) acting as a partner and teaming up with local organizations to implement critical programs; and (3) acting as an anchor institution and supporting local economic and social progress.

The community health measure is measured as a percentage. 100% is the highest score possible. Submitting a survey and sharing your data is 25% (data transparency). Each of the other components of the survey—hospital as a provider, hospital as a partner, and hospital as an anchor institution is worth an additional 25%. In order to receive the full 25% for each component, hospitals needed to attest to at least half of the best practice standards.

Where a hospital did not submit a survey in the 2023 study year, but had previously submitted one in the 2022 or 2021 study year, those previous survey results were included in the calculation of the 2023 final ranking.

Hospital measure domains

Clinical outcomes
There are five clinical measures used in the scorecard. Measures include (1) risk-adjusted IP mortality, (2) risk-adjusted complications, (3) healthcare associated infections*, (4) 30-day mortality and (5) 30-day readmissions. *Health care associated infections are excluded for the Small Community Hospitals peer group.

Operational efficiency
There are three operational efficiency measures used in the scorecard: (1) severity adjusted length of stay, (2) Medicare spending per beneficiary and (3) adjusted inpatient expense per discharge.

Patient experience
The patient experience measure reflects the overall patient rating from the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) survey tool.

Financial health
The financial health measure used in the scorecard is adjusted operating profit margin.

Community health survey performance
The community health survey performance is based on the survey developed by the Bloomberg
American Health Initiative and the Center for Health Equity at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Stars key:

  • 5 stars (★★★★★) = Hospital performing at top quintile (>80-100%) within their peer group
  • 4 stars (★★★★) = Hospital performing within second quintile (>60-80%) within their peer group
  • 3 stars (★★★) = Hospital performing within third quintile (>40-60%) within their peer group
  • 2 stars (★★) = Hospital performing within fourth quintile (>20-40%) within their peer group
  • 1 star (★) = Hospital performing in the bottom quintile (0-20%) within their peer group

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