Methodology for the Fortune/PINC AI 15 Top Health Systems 2024
15 Top Health Systems Methodology Overview
To conduct the 15 Top Health Systems study, researchers evaluated 355 health systems and 2,778 hospitals that are members of health systems. 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. Health Systems and Hospitals do not apply for awards, and winners do not pay to market this honor. For more information, visit http://www.100tophospitals.com/.
Class definition
Each health system is defined within a class based on their total operating expense, number of U.S states in which they have member hospitals, and the number of member hospitals.
Large Health Systems – 173 Health Systems
Medium Health Systems – 92 Health Systems
Small Health Systems – 90 Health Systems
Health system comparison groups
3 = Large Health System
There are three ways to qualify:
1) where total operating expense is >= $2.5 billion OR
2) where total operating exp is >= $1.5 billion and member hospitals >= 5 STGAC OR
3) where total operating exp is >= $1.5 billion and member hospitals in >= 3 states
2 = Medium Health System
There are two ways to qualify:
1) where total operating expense is >= $ 1 billion OR
2) where total operating expense is >= $800 million and member hospitals >= 5 STGAC
1 = Small Health System
Does not meet large or medium class criteria
Final rank
Final rank is determined based on performance for all individual measures. Hospitals are ranked within their peer group.
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) health care-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 two operational efficiency measures used in the scorecard: (1) severity adjusted length of stay and (2) Medicare spending per beneficiary.
Patient experience
The patient experience measure reflects the overall patient rating from the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) survey tool.
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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