Should hospitals withdraw from US News & World Report rankings?
After several big-name institutions have withdrawn from national rankings of medical schools, two physicians are calling on hospitals to follow suit in an op-ed in Health Affairs.
U.S. News & World Report started publishing rankings in higher education in 1983 before ranking U.S. hospitals in 1990 and pediatric hospitals in 2007.
The rankings are followed closely in the United States and can majorly impact where students decide to apply to medical school and how patients view the quality of care. However, institutions, including Yale, Harvard, Stanford and the University of Washington (UW) have withdrawn from consideration recently, citing issues with the evaluation process and methodology by U.S. News & World Report.
“It’s time for US hospitals to follow the example of medical and law schools by withdrawing from the US News rankings,” wrote co-authors Madeline Wozniak and Chinenyenwa Mpamaugo, both pediatricians in Seattle, Washington.
According to the writers, most consumers view U.S. News & World report’s rankings as objective and an impartial observer “working in their best interests.” However, a deeper review of “what U.S. News values within its specialty rankings can serve as a window to who it values,” they said. In particular, healthcare inequality to Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) communities has come under the spotlight.
Comparing specific diseases, such as cystic fibrosis (CF) and sickle cell disease (SCD), that disproportionately affect different demographics can highlight some of the issues with the U.S. News & World Report rankings, the co-authors wrote. CF primarily affects white children, while SCD primarily affects Black children. While SCD impacts far more children and causes vast more hospitalizations than CF, it is mentioned less in US News’ Children’s Hospital rankings. Further, hospitals are weighted more for CF compared to SCD. Even if hospitals can achieve points for the rankings due to leadership having EDI training, the methodology does not go far enough to adjust to racial disparities in the healthcare industry.
[What most hospital ranking systems are missing]
“Dramatically overvaluing CF over SCD in rankings illustrates just how much US News has failed to critically analyze structural racism in medicine, a failure that only perpetuates health inequities rather than addresses them,” the authors wrote.
This, along with other failures in the methodology, is why the authors said hospitals should withdraw from the rankings entirely, following in the footsteps of other powerful institutions.
“If, like universities, hospitals divorce themselves from ratings, we can refocus on the mission of treating our patients and communities equitably, and not being unduly influenced by flawed US News incentives,” they concluded.
Amy joined TriMed Media as a Senior Writer for HealthExec after covering home care for three years. When not writing about all things healthcare, she fulfills her lifelong dream of becoming a pirate by sailing in regattas and enjoying rum. Fun fact: she sailed 333 miles across Lake Michigan in the Chicago Yacht Club "Race to Mackinac."