Quote:
Originally Posted by BrianL99
I admittedly don't know much about medicine, but I suspect the ratings are also skewed by fact the local hospital deals with a fairly vulnerable demographic?
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Partially. They generally look at only a few diagnoses---acute myocardial infarction, community acquired pneumonia, congestive heart failure and nosocomial/post op infections. A more elderly population tends not to do as well with these particular conditions. Also, some of the metrics are not really quality related----if a nurse gives you your 5 PM Tylenol at 5:30, everything is fine. If it is given at 5:31 that is considered a "medication error". If the patient dies 2 weeks later of their stage 4 pancreatic cancer but is still in the hospital on the same admission, that is a "death due to medication error", at least in part. I don't know about Florida, but in NY the health department's main goal is not quality of care, but how bad they can make doctors, nurses and hospitals look. Most states have a health department that is a few rooms in the capitol, NY has a 50-story office building in Albany. They employ over 5,000, and NY City employs another 7,000+, Ohio about 1,100 and Arizona has 800.