Dive Brief:
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Truven Health Analytics recently announced the findings of its annual study to name the 100 top U.S. hospitals based on their overall performance.
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The researchers found a trend, unprecedented in the study's 23-year history, in which the majority of the top performing hospitals were able to simultaneously improve outcomes and reduce overall costs per patient.
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Truven also recognized, for its eighth year running, its Everest Award winners--those hospitals among the top 100 winners that demonstrated the most improvement over five years. It selected 17 winners for the honor this year.
Dive Insight:
Truven's analysis shows promising results in that hopitals were able to combine improved performance with reduced costs.
It finds the top performing hospitals had better survival rates, fewer complications, lower 30-day mortality and readmission rates, shorter length of stay and higher profit overall margins--all while maintaining inpatient costs 3% lower per beneficiary than other peer hospitals. Truven also reports a year-over-year dip in total inpatient expense per discharge among the top 100 hospitals, in the categories of major teaching, teaching, and small community hospitals.
“Many of the 2016 100 Top Hospitals award winners are breaking the mold for high performance," Jean Chenoweth, senior vice president at Truven Health Analytics, said n a prepared statement. "Hospitals in three out of the five hospital categories actually reduced overall expense year over year, while improving patient outcomes." Chenoweth adds, “Some of these hospitals also show a small degradation of operating profit margin. Hopefully this is not an indicator of a developing trend.”
The winning hospitals can be viewed at 100tophospitals.com.