IBM Watson Health Announces 100 Top Hospitals

IBM Watson Health™ (NYSE: IBM) today published its 100 Top Hospitals® annual study identifying top-performing hospitals in the U.S. based on overall organizational performance. Formerly known as the Truven Health Analytics® 100 Top Hospitals, this study spotlights the best-performing hospitals in the U.S. based on a balanced scorecard of publicly available clinical, operational, and patient satisfaction metrics and data. It has been conducted annually since 1993.

Overall, the Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals® study found that the top-performing hospitals in the country achieved better risk-adjusted outcomes while maintaining both a lower average cost per beneficiary and higher profit margin than non-winning peer group hospitals.

Following were the key performance measures on which 100 Top Hospitals showed the most significant outperformance versus non-winning peer group hospitals:

• Better Survival Rates: Overall, 100 Top Hospitals winners achieved survival rates that were 26 percentage points better than those of peer hospitals.
• Fewer Complications and Infections: Patients at winning hospitals experienced 13.4 percent fewer complications and 18.7 percent fewer healthcare-associated infections than peer group hospitals.
• Shorter Length of Stay: Winning hospitals had a median severity-adjusted length of stay that was nearly one half-day shorter (0.4) than peers.
• Shorter Emergency Department Wait Times: Overall, winning hospitals delivered median emergency department wait times that were 17 minutes shorter than those of peer group hospitals.
• Lower Inpatient Expenses: Average inpatient costs per discharge were 7 percent lower (a difference of $460 per discharge) at 100 Top Hospitals versus peer group hospitals.
• Higher Profit Overall Margins: Winning hospitals maintained a median operating profit margin that was 10.6 percentage points higher than peer group hospitals.
• Higher Patient Satisfaction: Overall hospital experience, as measured by the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS), was rated 3.4 percent higher for winning hospitals than peer group hospitals.

"The country's best hospitals have proven that an unrelenting focus on quality, supported by constant measurement against peer performance benchmarks, can drive improved outcomes while reducing costs and growing profit margins," said Jean Chenoweth, senior vice president, 100 Top Hospitals Programs, IBM Watson Health. "Congratulations to this 25^th anniversary class of 100 Top Hospitals who have helped raise the bar for healthcare in the U.S. and improve the healthcare experiences of the people in their communities."

The IBM Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals winners outperformed peer group hospitals on all 11 clinical and operational performance benchmarks evaluated in the study: risk-adjusted inpatient mortality index, risk-adjusted complications index, mean healthcare-associated infection index, mean 30-day risk-adjusted mortality rate, mean 30-day risk-adjusted readmission rate, severity-adjusted length of stay, mean emergency department throughput, case mix- and wage-adjusted inpatient expense per discharge, Medicare spend per beneficiary index, adjusted operating profit margin, and HCAHPS score.

Extrapolating the results of this year's study, if all Medicare inpatients received the same level of care as those treated in the award-winning facilities:

• More than 102,000 additional lives could be saved;
• More than 43,000 additional patients could be complication-free;
• More than $4.4 billion in inpatient costs could be saved; and
• Approximately 200,000 fewer discharged patients would be readmitted within 30 days.

In addition to the 100 Top Hospitals, the IBM Watson Health study also recognizes the 100 Top Hospitals Everest Award winners. These are hospitals that earned the 100 Top Hospitals designation and also are among the 100 top for rate of improvement over five years. This year, there are 13 Everest Award winners.

To conduct the 100 Top Hospitals study, IBM Watson Health researchers evaluated 2,740 short-term, acute care, non-federal hospitals. 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. Hospitals do not apply for awards, and winners do not pay to market this honor.

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