How Does Your Hospital Measure Up

[ExFed]

I'm a regular reader of this forum, but I don't post much. However, I got an email yesterday from Medicare.com providing overall ratings and patient ratings for hospitals in our area and thought it might be of interest to some of you.

The ratings were between 5 stars for the best rating and 1 star for the lowest. I took a look and found the following ratings for hospitals in our vicinity and the results were as follows:

Villages Regional Hospital: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 1
UF Health Leesburg: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
AdventHealth Ocala: Overall rating: 1 Patient rating: 2
Marion Hospital Ocala: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
AdventHealth Waterman Tavares: Overall rating: 4 Patient rating: 3
Citrus Memorial Hospital Inverness: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2

Please note that these ratings came to me from Medicare.com and I have done nothing to validate or invalidate the information they provided. Feel free to visit their website if you wish to fact check me or to further explore the accuracy of the data they provided.

Having personally been a patient only at Villages Regional Hospital on a single referral from my General Practitioner, my personal limited experience is that VRH is the worst hospital I have ever experienced. It may be that they were off their game that evening and my experience might be much better if I have future visits.

After my wife (a retired nurse) and I looked at the results, we are a bit worried that there doesn't appear to be a local hospital that we have confidence in using when the need arises.

I welcome any comments from those of you that have experiences at any of these hospitals that you found to be better than the ratings from Medicare.com.

[billethkid]

Advent hospital in Ocala is our hospital of choice.

[OrangeBlossomBaby]

I guess it all depends on what you need the hospital FOR. They have some top-notch orthopedic surgeons at the VRH (which is now a UF Health facility). They're also RIGHT THERE, which is pretty convenient if you need inpatient care and live with your loved ones. They can visit you by golf cart, no need to stress out on a highway or major county road.

[Michael G.]

Marion county Hospital in Ocala for me

[villagetinker]

There was a prior thread that looked into how these ratings are actually calculated, and as I recall these may be artificially LOW due to the older population in this area having a much lower survival rate. I have not used the hospital, so I do not have any personal experience, however from comments I have seen if you can avoid the ER the comments were generally positive.

[golfing eagles]

Well, there are 6,090 hospitals in the US. Somebody has to get stuck with the worst one. But it's no different than the NIMBY crowd for nuclear power plants or landfills----Not In My Back Yard----stick someone else with the worst

[tophcfa]

Villages Regional Hospital: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 1
UF Health Leesburg: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
AdventHealth Ocala: Overall rating: 1 Patient rating: 2
Marion Hospital Ocala: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
AdventHealth Waterman Tavares: Overall rating: 4 Patient rating: 3
Citrus Memorial Hospital Inverness: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
.

My only experience with any of those hospitals is the Villages Hospital off El Camino Real near Spanish Springs. There isn’t a rating low enough that I could give that horrible place. I would rather die than go through the experience again that I had there.

[manaboutown]

Even back in the 1970s when some of my relatives moved to Central Florida the medical care in the area was notoriously poor. They went back up to doctors in Maryland and lived into their 90s.

[Rainger99]

My only experience with any of those hospitals is the Villages Hospital off El Camino Real near Spanish Springs. There isn’t a rating low enough that I could give that horrible place. I would rather die than go through the experience again that I had there.

Can you be more specific as to what was so horrible?
Horrible is conclusory. Did they keep you waiting in the ER for 30 minutes before you saw a doctor? Or did they amputate the wrong leg?

If we know more facts, it will help us decide whether we should go there or look elsewhere. We can make an informed decision.

If someone said that a restaurant was horrible, I would like to know why. Was the soup cold or did you get salmonella?

[kaydee]

West Marion for either myself or my husband! If needed, Summerfield ER!

[Stu from NYC]

Well, there are 6,090 hospitals in the US. Somebody has to get stuck with the worst one. But it's no different than the NIMBY crowd for nuclear power plants or landfills----Not In My Back Yard----stick someone else with the worst

After UF purchased the Village hospital are you surprised it is still getting such low marks?

[Stu from NYC]

West Marion for either myself or my husband! If needed, Summerfield ER!

Wife was at West Marion 18 months ago for surgery and was very impressed with their care.

[RPDaly]

----

[tophcfa]

Can you be more specific as to what was so horrible?
Horrible is conclusory. Did they keep you waiting in the ER for 30 minutes before you saw a doctor? Or did they amputate the wrong leg?

If we know more facts, it will help us decide whether we should go there or look elsewhere. We can make an informed decision.

If someone said that a restaurant was horrible, I would like to know why. Was the soup cold or did you get salmonella?

Hmmm, specifics. Try having a serious life threatening illness (not Covid), being in the worst possible agony imaginable, spending approximately 12 1/2 hours in a filthy ER, finally being totally misdiagnosed and sent packing (should have been admitted to ICU) to drive myself home to die, in a golf cart after midnight when I could barely walk or talk. When my wife arrived to save my life and got me to a real hospital in Gainesville (I couldn’t possibly drive myself), the triage team quickly evaluated me and rushed me to critical care. There isn’t a low enough grade possible for the ER at the Villages hospital.

[Rainger99]

Hmmm, specifics. Try having a serious life threatening illness (not Covid), being in the worst possible agony imaginable, spending approximately 12 1/2 hours in a filthy ER, finally being totally misdiagnosed and sent packing (should have been admitted to ICU) to drive myself home to die, in a golf cart after midnight when I could barely walk or talk. When my wife arrived to save my life and got me to a real hospital in Gainesville (I couldn’t possibly drive myself), the triage team quickly evaluated me and rushed me to critical care. There isn’t a low enough grade possible for the ER at the Villages hospital.

Thanks. I will steer clear of it. I would think insurance companies would ban poorly rated hospitals from their networks. That might be an incentive for the hospitals to improve their services.

[Stu from NYC]

Thanks. I will steer clear of it. I would think insurance companies would ban poorly rated hospitals from their networks. That might be an incentive for the hospitals to improve their services.

Wonder why they do not? Hit them in their pocketbooks would be a great incentive to improve

[ThirdOfFive]

Quite the rainbows-and-unicorns article on VRH in today's Daily Sun...

[Michael G.]

Hmmm, specifics. Try having a serious life threatening illness (not Covid), being in the worst possible agony imaginable, spending approximately 12 1/2 hours in a filthy ER, finally being totally misdiagnosed and sent packing (should have been admitted to ICU) to drive myself home to die, in a golf cart after midnight when I could barely walk or talk. When my wife arrived to save my life and got me to a real hospital in Gainesville (I couldn’t possibly drive myself), the triage team quickly evaluated me and rushed me to critical care. There isn’t a low enough grade possible for the ER at the Villages hospital.

OUCH......Not Good

[Michael G.]

Can you be more specific as to what was so horrible?
Horrible is conclusory. Did they keep you waiting in the ER for 30 minutes before you saw a doctor? Or did they amputate the wrong leg?

If we know more facts, it will help us decide whether we should go there or look elsewhere. We can make an informed decision.

If someone said that a restaurant was horrible, I would like to know why. Was the soup cold or did you get salmonella?

Here's some great questions that need to be addressed first before
writing bad reviews on all hospitals.

[Stu from NYC]

Quite the rainbows-and-unicorns article on VRH in today's Daily Sun...

Still shake my head over these one sided stories

[champion6]

Thanks. I will steer clear of it. I would think insurance companies would ban poorly rated hospitals from their networks. That might be an incentive for the hospitals to improve their services.

Wonder why they do not? Hit them in their pocketbooks would be a great incentive to improveHello. Are you paying attention? Medicare is an insurance company! And low ratings do reduce the medicare reimbursement that hospitals receive.

[Topspinmo]

Only you can answer those questions based on you’re health. If I was in poor health? 45 miles from Orlando or Gainesville IMO not good choice.

[Topspinmo]

Thanks. I will steer clear of it. I would think insurance companies would ban poorly rated hospitals from their networks. That might be an incentive for the hospitals to improve their services.


I’m surprised insurance lobbyist hasn’t written that into law. IMO there should be law if want sell insurance in United States they don’t make the rules and sell in all states or none. IMO I actually there should be one provider, the government, let government make billions and not private insurance and there CEO’s.

[Stu from NYC]

I’m surprised insurance lobbyist hasn’t written that into law. IMO there should be law if want sell insurance in United States they don’t make the rules and sell in all states or none. IMO I actually there should be one provider, the government, let government make billions and not private insurance and there CEO’s.

We should do a better job taking care of people but do not trust the govt to do a good job in this regard.

[jedalton]

yes

[TheWarriors]

yes

I wonder how many Villagers would approve of a yearly $500.00. Tax solely for hospital improvement? This would not be biased on the value of your home, but every address pays the same amount for the betterment of health care in the Villages. If the answer is no, you are receiving the care you are paying for and should have no complaints.

[banjobob]

My experiences with VRH were good and bad , a visit to the ER was a joke but my pacemaker implant surgery and stay was very favorable.

[MandoMan]

I'm a regular reader of this forum, but I don't post much. However, I got an email yesterday from Medicare.com providing overall ratings and patient ratings for hospitals in our area and thought it might be of interest to some of you.

The ratings were between 5 stars for the best rating and 1 star for the lowest. I took a look and found the following ratings for hospitals in our vicinity and the results were as follows:

Villages Regional Hospital: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 1
UF Health Leesburg: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
AdventHealth Ocala: Overall rating: 1 Patient rating: 2
Marion Hospital Ocala: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2
AdventHealth Waterman Tavares: Overall rating: 4 Patient rating: 3
Citrus Memorial Hospital Inverness: Overall rating: 2 Patient rating: 2

Please note that these ratings came to me from Medicare.com and I have done nothing to validate or invalidate the information they provided. Feel free to visit their website if you wish to fact check me or to further explore the accuracy of the data they provided.

Having personally been a patient only at Villages Regional Hospital on a single referral from my General Practitioner, my personal limited experience is that VRH is the worst hospital I have ever experienced. It may be that they were off their game that evening and my experience might be much better if I have future visits.

After my wife (a retired nurse) and I looked at the results, we are a bit worried that there doesn't appear to be a local hospital that we have confidence in using when the need arises.

I welcome any comments from those of you that have experiences at any of these hospitals that you found to be better than the ratings from Medicare.com.

While there are other ratings available from reliable sources, such as hospital accreditation boards, they tend to agree with the above numbers. This is why when I needed a hip replacement this year, I chose the top orthopedic surgeon at Advent Health Waterman, Jon Radnothy, even though the hospital is a 25 minute drive from my house. All my doctors practice there. The ratings are what sent me there.

Some of the ratings are due to a couple problems. The first is infections patients pick up while in the hospital, called “nosocomial infections”. Advent Health Waterman doesn’t have nearly as many because they are fanatical about avoiding them. Where they occur, it’s because of sloppiness when it comes to cleaning and sterile technique, with the resulting passage of infections to other patients. Back when people wore masks in public, I noticed that lots of people knew nothing about how masks work. They would have masks over their mouths but not their nose, or breath would come out the sides of the mask, or the mask would be too thin, or they would touch the outside of the mask and wipe it all over. Useless, pretty much. Similarly, hospitals have lots of custodial staff and nurse aids who are hard workers but know very little about germ theory and how infections are spread. Training these people is crucial if the infection rate is to go down.

The other big thing that hurts ratings is things like heart surgeries of various types and joint replacements done by doctors who don’t do them often or haven’t done enough of them yet. They may be board certified, and that is important, but still lack the experience that helps them make the right decision when an emergency occurs on the OR table. An orthopedic surgeon who does twelve total hip or knee replacements a week and nothing else will usually be better at it than an orthopedic surgeon who does all sorts of bone surgeries but only does a joint replacement maybe once a month. The ratings focus on these because they are illustrative of what is probably going on throughout the hospital in general.

[Jdburns11]

Hmmm, specifics. Try having a serious life threatening illness (not Covid), being in the worst possible agony imaginable, spending approximately 12 1/2 hours in a filthy ER, finally being totally misdiagnosed and sent packing (should have been admitted to ICU) to drive myself home to die, in a golf cart after midnight when I could barely walk or talk. When my wife arrived to save my life and got me to a real hospital in Gainesville (I couldn’t possibly drive myself), the triage team quickly evaluated me and rushed me to critical care. There isn’t a low enough grade possible for the ER at the Villages hospital.

I don’t normally chime in here but my wife also had an exceptionally bad experience at this hospital - she stated she’d rather die than go back. Staff didn’t treat her well (medically or personally) despite serious reasons & symptoms for entry - it traumatized her to be honest to some extent.

[Heytubes]

I’ve had to use the Villages hospital twice since May and other than a long wait in the ER (due to half the people being, shall I say visiting from the far, far south), my care was excellent. My second visit is recent, a three week stay where the staff was professional and very attentive 24/7. I’d give them a 4 rating. After that three weeks I was transferred to the Leesburg hospital for chemo and have been treated with excellent care. Remember, it’s only been about 2 plus years that the U of F bought Shands, the Villages and Leesburg hospitals. I think you need to know how ratings are achieved before making a judgment, such as how responsive are the short handed staff, is the food gourmet or are you expecting The Ritz Carlton treatment?
Leesburg is a step above, a 5, as my experience there is on the basis of specialized treatment.
So, while there may be better hospitals and staff elsewhere, I’d return to both of these facilities without hesitation. Remember, people who’ve had bad experiences vocalize louder than those with positive experiences.

[Sunny923!]

Wonder why they do not? Hit them in their pocketbooks would be a great incentive to improve

Oh they do. Dont worry, their reimbursements are based in their ratings. Bad ratings means fewer dollars coming in.

[eeroger]

I believe one of the reasons The Villages hospital ER is so bad is they do not have ER certified docs on staff. This was confirmed by a question & answer forum by one of the execs. Can't remember her name. Who knows what qualifications these docs have.

[mikreb]

I used UF Urgent Care and received awesome care. It's the people that make it work not the medicare ratings.

[Topspinmo]

We should do a better job taking care of people but do not trust the govt to do a good job in this regard.

IMO all insurance does it might a pay bill. The government can do that.

[BEETHOVENMIKEY]

My wife and I have both had inpatient and outpatient surgeries and tests at West Marion and love the staff and facility. Easy to get to and usually only 20 - 30 minutes away, from here in the north side of TVs. Where we came from, in central Maryland, it was 20 - 60 minutes to hospitals, so going to W. Marion is nothing.
We had very bad experiences at both Villages and Leesburg hospitals, the latter, father-in-law died following a successful shoulder replacement. Hospital staff allowed him to eat a meal immediately following surgery, before he was out from anesthesia. He didn't even know where he was yet, due to the drugs. He vomited, inhaled and dead 2 hours later.
We've got medical cards in our wallets, car and on the refrigerator instructing that if requiring hospitalization, we should be transported to West Marion. Our experience: 4.5 stars

[larcha]

On the Medicare ratings site the following caution is made:

"How should I use the hospital star ratings?
Star ratings can give you information and help you compare hospitals locally and nationwide, but you should consider a variety of factors when choosing a hospital, like physician guidance about your care plan. Along with the overall rating, you should look at other aspects of hospital quality like rates of infection and complications, and patients' experience of care based on survey results."

Many factors go into quality of care. All patient experiences are different but ultimately it's your experience that matters. That said, I think the patients' survey results are for me the best measure.

[starkk]

We go to Shands because of the past ratings and past family experiences

[tophcfa]

Quite the rainbows-and-unicorns article on VRH in today's Daily Sun...

The article was partially correct, but incomplete. It states VRH is “fostering unmatched medical care for retirees”. What the article fails to mention is the health care is unmatched because it’s unimaginable anyplace else could be any worse.

[Ramone]

Hmmm, specifics. Try having a serious life threatening illness (not Covid), being in the worst possible agony imaginable, spending approximately 12 1/2 hours in a filthy ER, finally being totally misdiagnosed and sent packing (should have been admitted to ICU) to drive myself home to die, in a golf cart after midnight when I could barely walk or talk. When my wife arrived to save my life and got me to a real hospital in Gainesville (I couldn’t possibly drive myself), the triage team quickly evaluated me and rushed me to critical care. There isn’t a low enough grade possible for the ER at the Villages hospital.

I Agee, went to same ER on a Monday 4PM in Mid May, 20-30 others lined up. Checked in for blood clot on eye (per eye doctors) and waited till 7:30PM and left. Came back 8AM next day, waited hour and taken to ER exam room. Waited 1 hour for doc, routine exam, told to wait for some test he wants, CT Scan, Blood, MRI. Waited 3 hours got blood test. Now late afternoon, no food and little water. Late afternoon Nerologist (spelling) seen, told I was being admitted. For what I asked, observation they said. Put in room to wait for further test, told they were busy and short of staff. Got CT Scan. Got a sandwich and applesauce for dinner. I.V.s in and heart monitor on. Nurse tried to get me first on list for MRI, she succeeded on getting me in at 6:30 am, where tech said they were not busy yesterday. Oh!
No waited for some food, new un caring nurse asked for some food, she sniffled and half hour later got some cereal. 1PM Neorologist asst came in and wanted to keep me another day. Would not adjust meds or anything. I said I wanted out, she said no, I ripped the IV out of arm and heart monitor off and left. Fine ever since

[tophcfa]

I Agee, went to same ER on a Monday 4PM in Mid May, 20-30 others lined up. Checked in for blood clot on eye (per eye doctors) and waited till 7:30PM and left. Came back 8AM next day, waited hour and taken to ER exam room. Waited 1 hour for doc, routine exam, told to wait for some test he wants, CT Scan, Blood, MRI. Waited 3 hours got blood test. Now late afternoon, no food and little water. Late afternoon Nerologist (spelling) seen, told I was being admitted. For what I asked, observation they said. Put in room to wait for further test, told they were busy and short of staff. Got CT Scan. Got a sandwich and applesauce for dinner. I.V.s in and heart monitor on. Nurse tried to get me first on list for MRI, she succeeded on getting me in at 6:30 am, where tech said they were not busy yesterday. Oh!
No waited for some food, new un caring nurse asked for some food, she sniffled and half hour later got some cereal. 1PM Neorologist asst came in and wanted to keep me another day. Would not adjust meds or anything. I said I wanted out, she said no, I ripped the IV out of arm and heart monitor off and left. Fine ever since

Sorry you had to go through that, but totally not surprised. The saddest part is you had a relatively good experience, with short waiting times, compared to my horrendous experience on June 8th, 2021 (which went into the wee hours of the 9th).

It absolutely amazes me that so much attention is being given to getting quicker response emergency services. Why, so you can get dumped off at the Villages Hospital? Based on my experience at that hell hole, I would rather stay home and die.

[Stu from NYC]

I Agee, went to same ER on a Monday 4PM in Mid May, 20-30 others lined up. Checked in for blood clot on eye (per eye doctors) and waited till 7:30PM and left. Came back 8AM next day, waited hour and taken to ER exam room. Waited 1 hour for doc, routine exam, told to wait for some test he wants, CT Scan, Blood, MRI. Waited 3 hours got blood test. Now late afternoon, no food and little water. Late afternoon Nerologist (spelling) seen, told I was being admitted. For what I asked, observation they said. Put in room to wait for further test, told they were busy and short of staff. Got CT Scan. Got a sandwich and applesauce for dinner. I.V.s in and heart monitor on. Nurse tried to get me first on list for MRI, she succeeded on getting me in at 6:30 am, where tech said they were not busy yesterday. Oh!
No waited for some food, new un caring nurse asked for some food, she sniffled and half hour later got some cereal. 1PM Neorologist asst came in and wanted to keep me another day. Would not adjust meds or anything. I said I wanted out, she said no, I ripped the IV out of arm and heart monitor off and left. Fine ever since

Disgraceful

[Villagesgal]

Waterman in Eustis.

[Villages Kahuna]

I was told by a local doctor that if I ever found myself in TVRH, the first thing I should do is call a taxi and go to another hospital. “Those people will kill you.”, he advised.

My recent personal experience in TVRH ER confirms that advice. My doctor sent me to TVRH and ordered the infusion of two units of a blood component. I decided to go to TVRH thinking, how could they screw up a simple blood infusion?

I arrived at about 4:15 PM. After admission, I waited in the ER waiting room about 3 hours to be called for a ‘cross and match” blood test. I was then returned to the waiting room, where I waited until about 1 AM before being called into the ER itself (where the halls were lined with patients on beds, apparently waiting for a room in the hospital itself). I then waited until 3 AM before the 15 minute infusion began. As the nurse began to disconnect me, I asked if she had administered two units as my doctor had ordered. No she replied, she thought I was supposed to get only one unit. She then scrambled to get me re-hooked up and administered another unit, as my doctor had ordered. By then it was 3:30 AM and very quiet, because there had been a shift change in the ER. When I finally was disconnected from the tubing, they left the needle in my arm and said a doctor would have to approve my discharge. But, it was explained, the ER doctor who had to discharge me didn’t start his shift until 5 AM. I finally walked out the front door of the ER, where my wife had been waiting for almost two hours, at 5:15 AM.

So The Villages Regional Hospital made me wait 13 hours to get a 15-minute procedure, and then made a mistake following the doctors order!
———————-
Having said that about TVRH, I had an excellent, prompt and thorough experience in the Leesburg Regional Hospital ER only weeks later. I have also been told by a friend who is a cardiologist at John’s Hopkins hospital, that based on his experience when he needed a heart procedure while visiting, that “I’m a cardiologist and I know a good cardiology department when I see one and Leesburg Hospital has a first class cardiology department.
————————
Should I need hospitalization in the future on an emergency basis, I’ll choose Leesburg Regional. If the care I need is not emergency, I’ll drive 45 minutes to Advent Waterman or an hour or so to Shands in Gainesville.

[Michael G.]

Would it do any good for these hospitals to read some of these horror story's posted here?
I'm sure the ER people if given a choice would not like to be treated like animals in the a.m. hours.

And hearing these story's, how much do people just by avoiding the village hospital to a point where the must ask, "Why has business been down so much lately?"

Just don't make sense

[Djean1981]

What's the link to TVRH? - so I don't go there...

[golfing eagles]

After UF purchased the Village hospital are you surprised it is still getting such low marks?

Not really, it takes years for these ratings to change. Also, I need to know what goes into these "ratings", some are very heavily skewed against and aging population.

That being said, we have nearly 150,000 residents in peak season, ALMOST ALL of whom are 55+. When you compare that with the average demographics of the US from the 2020 census in which 29% of the population is over 55, it essentially gives us the age and medical problems of a city of 517,000, and only TWO hospitals both of which have staffing shortages.

Tucson:There are 25 Hospitals in Tucson, Arizona, serving a population of 530,905 people in an area of 231 square miles. There is 1 Hospital per 21,236 people, and 1 Hospital per 9 square miles.

I'm not saying we need 25 hospitals (nor does Tuscon), but probably 4 or 5 is a realistic number. The problem is there is no good way to get doctors and nurses to staff them, there is no great attraction here for younger professionals. As a result, we often end up with "B" players, locum tenens and out of area ER physician groups, none of which care for our community as much as a doctor or nurse that lives here would, and from what I've seen are more interested in watching the clock than moving patients through the ER. I used to say 2 of my friends and I could straighten out the ER at TVRH in 3 months, I now retract that statement. The "culture" of drag your heels and everyone can wait is so entrenched that you would have to fire everyone and start over, which is just not feasible with a healthcare personnel shortage

[Jeanne wilson]

I'm a tax-paying resident of Florida and Ohio, I don't pay a cent to one of the best hospitals in the country, Cleveland Clinic.

[Stu from NYC]

Not really, it takes years for these ratings to change. Also, I need to know what goes into these "ratings", some are very heavily skewed against and aging population.

That being said, we have nearly 150,000 residents in peak season, ALMOST ALL of whom are 55+. When you compare that with the average demographics of the US from the 2020 census in which 29% of the population is over 55, it essentially gives us the age and medical problems of a city of 517,000, and only TWO hospitals both of which have staffing shortages.

Tucson:There are 25 Hospitals in Tucson, Arizona, serving a population of 530,905 people in an area of 231 square miles. There is 1 Hospital per 21,236 people, and 1 Hospital per 9 square miles.

I'm not saying we need 25 hospitals (nor does Tuscon), but probably 4 or 5 is a realistic number. The problem is there is no good way to get doctors and nurses to staff them, there is no great attraction here for younger professionals. As a result, we often end up with "B" players, locum tenens and out of area ER physician groups, none of which care for our community as much as a doctor or nurse that lives here would, and from what I've seen are more interested in watching the clock than moving patients through the ER. I used to say 2 of my friends and I could straighten out the ER at TVRH in 3 months, I now retract that statement. The "culture" of drag your heels and everyone can wait is so entrenched that you would have to fire everyone and start over, which is just not feasible with a healthcare personnel shortage

Thank you.

[cdzizzy]

My husband spent a week at Villages Regional near Spanish last January. Care was excellent. Doctor was fantastic, no complaints until it was time to release him — after a week
we were ready to have him home, but the nursing staff seemed too busy and he was released about 3 hours after he should have been. Otherwise, very positive experience.

[Walt6977]

Village regional Hospital ER poorly run. I spent five hours in the ER no one did triage on me and I spoke to others that have been there eight hours with no triage. They need to board up and close the village ER they don’t even know how to triage

[CoachKandSportsguy]

Patient experience data lags about 6 months to 1 year, which is based on the date of patient discharge.
That's relatively recent with survey data, which takes time to compile and review.

Surveys are about a year long, so the surveys were done from patients discharged from two years to one year ago.

So there is time to fix the particular hospital, however, there is a huge medical staffing shortage right now, due to illness, retirement, and personal beliefs differing from their employer. So not sure that you are going to get much better without going to a UF Shands in Gainesville, Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, or Cleveland Clinic in Boca, where standards are very high.

Hospital solvency is also a big issue if there isn't a local source of staffing, and traveling staff are used at 2x or 3x the local going rate for employment.

So be careful out there, and there are other areas of FL which have good local healthcare if that is important to you

[Fltpkr]

I think the OP has put their finger on the biggest single issue for the Villages - the lack of great medical care and choices in close proximity to the Villages. Who would have thought! Strictly my opinion.

[golfing eagles]

I think the OP has put their finger on the biggest single issue for the Villages - the lack of great medical care and choices in close proximity to the Villages. Who would have thought! Strictly my opinion.

Well, all I can say is that if "great medical care" is a priority for some, don't move here. Boston and NYC should be your first choice.

PS: You could move to Luxemburg, which the communist/socialist group titled "The World Health Organization" ranks #1 for health care in the world. However, you might be lonely since no one who knows anything about medicine would ever go to Luxemburg for health care. Personally, I think we should just "defund" the WHO since we supply the majority of it's funding and get nothing but denigration and BS in return.