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Friday, May 1, 2015

Shouldn't there be some response to the Leapfrog report?

An entity called the Leapfrog Group turns out a safety rating of hospitals around the U.S. The rating report is said to be done on behalf of employers seeking to hold down health care costs. The L.A.-area ratings appear as an interactive chart in the Los Angeles Times at http://graphics.latimes.com/california-hospital-scores/ along with a descriptive article at http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-hospital-scores-20150429-story.html. A journal article describing the ratings is at http://www.hospitalsafetyscore.org/media/file/JournalofPatientSafety_HospitalSafetyScore.pdf and has as a final author someone from UC-SF.  The journal article claims there is no "strong" bias in the rating system against particular types of hospitals. It is puzzling, however, why UCLA's Santa Monica Hospital gets an A grade while Reagan Hospital in Westwood gets a C. Moreover, Reagan's rating jumps around from survey to survey while Santa Monica's rating is relatively constant. Shouldn't someone respond? Explain?

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