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Page: << Prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | Next >> For example, a patient undergoing coronary bypass surgery has a 72.9 percent lower risk of dying if the procedure is done at a 5-star hospital, compared with a 1-star hospital. If all Medicare-covered bypass patients had the procedure done in 5-star hospitals, 5,308 lives would have been saved between 2003-2005, according to the report.
Collier found that the risk of dying in a hospital improved nearly 8 percent from 2003 to 2005. However, this improvement varied widely by procedure and diagnosis.
In addition, 5-star hospitals had significantly lower death rates for all three years of the study and showed a 19 percent improvement in quality compared to just "average" hospitals. They also marked a 57 percent gain in quality improvement over 1-star hospitals during the study period.
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Furthermore, a typical patient has 69 percent lower risk of dying in a 5-star hospital compared with a 1-star hospital, and a 49 percent lower risk of dying in a 5-star hospital compared to an average-quality U.S. hospital, Collier found.
The reasons for these disparities are many, Collier said. One common problem: in-house management systems that don't adequately keep track of patients and treatments. In other cases, understaffing or the use of doctors who are unskilled in a particular procedure adds to a hospital's woes, she said.
Collier advised patients to check out prospective hospitals before going in for a procedure. They should also check out the hospital's record on that particular procedure, she said.
"There are resources where you can get objective information about outcomes," Collier said. "You need to check it out."
One expert called the HealthGrades report useful for consumers.
"It stands to reason that most hospitals have relatively average outcomes, while some perform remarkably well and some disturbingly poorly," said Dr. David L. Katz, an associate professor of public health and director of the Prevention Research Center at Yale University School of Medicine.
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