The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services released new ratings on 4,000 hospitals in early July. The information, based on expanded data from previous ratings, are posted for public use on the CMS “Hospital Compare” website.
CMS officials said the agency has updated Hospital Compare with better data on the previously posted mortality rates for individual hospitals, as well as new data on 30-day readmissions for heart attack, heart failure, and pneumonia. Previously, Hospital Compare had provided only mortality rates for these three conditions. The information is captured from hospital Medicare claims data.
According to the new data, CMS estimates that the national 30-day mortality rate for patients originally admitted for heart attack care is 16.6 percent. For heart failure, the national 30-day mortality rate is 11.1 percent, and for pneumonia the rate is 11.5 percent.
CMS officials said readmission data (i.e., how frequently patients return to a hospital after being discharged) might be “a possible indicator of how well the facility did the first time around.”
“Providing readmission rates by hospital will give consumers even better information with which to compare local providers,” said Charlene Frizzera, CMS acting administrator. “Readmission rates will help consumers identify those providers in the community who are furnishing high-value healthcare with the best results.”
In 2008 the site had over 18 million page views, and has received about 1 million page views per month so far in 2009.
Barry Straube, MD, CMS chief medical officer and director of the CMS Office of Clinical Standards and Quality said the new expanded data gives a clearer picture of the quality of care delivered at different hospitals over time, increasing the value of the information to hospital patients, healthcare payers, employers, policymakers, and other healthcare stakeholders.
Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the Obama Administration has targeted reduction of readmissions as one of its health reform goals.