Hospital rating systems receive less-than-stellar grades in new analysis

An evaluation of U.S. hospital quality rating systems finds that all of them have flawed measures and shortcomings, and none of them earned an A grade. Researchers looked at hospital ranking systems  from four places —  U.S. News & World Report, CMS, Leapfrog, and Healthgrades — and found that there was no consistent standard. All the systems shared some common pitfalls, including relying on data that wasn’t audited regularly and not subjecting their ranking methods to peer review. Still, the authors of the new report ranked U.S. News highest — with a B rating — for reasons including the system is updated annually in response to feedback. The CMS system earned a C rating, while Leapfrog got a C-, and Healthgrades a D+.