Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) has been named to the ‘Honor Roll’ of the nation’s top hospitals by U.S. News and World Report in their 2018-2019 ranking of ‘America’s Best Hospitals.’ VUMC is one of only 20 hospitals nationwide to earn this distinction.
In addition to ‘Honor Roll’ status, 10 of VUMC’s specialty programs are nationally ranked, with three specialties — Gynecology, Nephrology and Urology — rated in the top 10 among peers.
The rankings, released today (Aug. 14), reflect VUMC’s longstanding commitment to offer compassionate, personalized care to patients and their families, and highlight the capabilities of its people to advance scientific discoveries into innovative clinical care.
To arrive at these rankings the U.S. News’ methodology is based largely on objective measures such as risk-adjusted survival and readmission rates, volume, patient experience, patient safety and quality of nursing, among other care-related indicators.
“Recognitions such as these from U.S. News are the result of contributions from each member of the VUMC community to deliver the very best to the patients we serve. I want to express my appreciation to our physicians, nurses and staff for these outstanding results,” said C. Wright Pinson, MBA, MD, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Health System Officer for VUMC.
VUMC is nationally ranked in these 10 specialties:
- Cancer
- Cardiology and Heart Surgery
- Ear, Nose and Throat
- Gastroenterology
- Gynecology
- Nephrology
- Neurology and Neurosurgery
- Orthopaedics
- Pulmonology
- Urology
VUMC is also recognized as nationally high-performing in eight procedures and conditions:
- Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm Repair
- Aortic Valve Surgery
- Colon Cancer Surgery
- Congestive Heart Failure
- Heart Bypass Surgery
- Hip Replacement
- Knee Replacement
- Lung Cancer Surgery
U.S. News evaluated 4,656 hospitals to determine this year’s rankings. Initial eligibility to be ranked requires that a hospital must be a teaching hospital, or affiliated with a medical school, or have at least 200 beds, or at least 100 beds and offer access to certain medical technologies. Ranking in a particular specialty imposes a second eligibility requirement meeting a volume/discharge threshold that varies by specialty.
Specialty rankings assess hospital performance in 16 specialties. In 12 specialties, results are determined by data-driven analysis combining performance measures in three dimensions of health care — structure, process /expert opinion and outcomes. In four other specialties, rankings rely on hospital reputation as determined by U.S. News’ surveys of physicians.
To recognize nationally high performing procedures and conditions, U.S. News evaluated more than 4,400 hospitals in at least one of nine procedures or conditions through methods developed by their health services researchers using data from the federal government’s Hospital Compare program, the American Hospital Association annual survey, publicly available clinical registry data, external designations and post-discharge patient surveys.
In a separate ranking released in June, U.S. News named Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt among the nation’s ‘Best Children’s Hospitals,’ with 10 pediatric specialty programs nationally ranked. These programs are: Cancer; Cardiology and Heart Surgery; Diabetes and Endocrinology; Gastroenterology and GI Surgery; Neonatology; Nephrology; Neurology and Neurosurgery; Orthopaedics; Pulmonology; and Urology.
The ‘America’s Best Hospitals’ rankings can be found online at www.usnews.com/besthospitals and the publication’s print edition, scheduled to be released later this month.
