UCLA Tops California's Best Hospitals: Latest U.S. News Rankings

LOS ANGELES, CA — U.S. News & World Report has released its latest rankings of the best hospitals in the United States, finding that some Los Angeles residents enjoy some of the best medical care in the nation.

UCLA Health hospitals in Westwood and Santa Monica placed No. 1 in both Los Angeles and California and No. 4 nationally in the annual rankings.

Across the Southland, Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian in Newport Beach was the highest ranked hospital in Orange County, the fourth-best hospital in the Los Angeles metro area and eighth-best in California. It was also recognized for high performance in 13 specialty procedures.

UCI Medical Center is ranked No. 5 in the Los Angeles metropolitan region.

UCLA Health comprises four hospitals on two campuses -- Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, UCLA Mattel Children's Hospital and the UCLA Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital on the university's main campus in Westwood, and UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica, plus more than 200 medical practices throughout Southern California. It also includes the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

"Every day, I am inspired by the teamwork of our physicians, nurses, health care professionals and support staff whose knowledge, skill, dedication and compassion make possible the excellence in health care," said Johnese Spisso, president of UCLA Health and CEO of the UCLA Hospital System. "I am incredibly proud of the work that our team members do each and every day to make a difference in the lives of patients and their families."

All rankings coming from data that was derived before the coronavirus pandemic. So the pandemic’s impact on hospitals nationwide is not shown in the latest rankings.

“The pandemic has altered, perhaps permanently, how patients get care and from whom they get it. Amid the disruption, we are steadfastly committed to providing the public with authoritative data for comparing hospital quality,” said Ben Harder, managing editor and chief of health analysis at U.S. News. “No hospital’s clinical team came through this unprecedented health crisis unscathed.”

The Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, was once again ranked as the best hospital in the nation.

U.S. News updated rankings for 16 medical specialties: cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, ear, nose and throat, gastroenterology and GI surgery, geriatrics, gynecology, nephrology, neurology and neurosurgery, ophthalmology, orthopedics, psychiatry, pulmonology and lung surgery, rehabilitation, rheumatology and urology.

The hospital rankings for 2020-21 include the Honor Roll, top-ranked hospitals in 16 specialty categories, and the top-ranked hospitals by state and metro region.

Twelve of the specialty rankings — which cover categories such as cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology and nephrology — are determined mostly by data; the other four specialties — ophthalmology, psychiatry, rehabilitation and rheumatology — are determined entirely by expert opinion, U.S. News said.

Honor Roll Hospitals

U.S. News said the hospitals that make the Honor Roll deliver exceptional treatment across multiple areas of care.

“The Honor Roll is geared to identifying hospitals that are both exceptionally good at the service they offer and offer a wide breadth of service,” Harder told Patch last year, explaining that by definition, that means hospitals that are highly ranked across many or most specialties.

The Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota took the No.1 spot on the 2020-21 Honor Roll, followed by the Cleveland Clinic and Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. New York-Presbyterian Hospital-Columbia and Cornell, New York and the UCLA Medical Center, Los Angeles rounded out the top five on the Honor Roll.

The remaining hospitals on the Honor Roll are:

• 6. Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston
• 7. Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, San Francisco
• 8. UCSF Medical Center, San Francisco
• 9. NYU Langone Hospitals, New York, N.Y.
• 10. Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago
• 11. University of Michigan Hospitals-Michigan Medicine, Ann Arbor
• 12. Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston
• 13. Stanford Health Care-Stanford Hospital, Palo Alto, California
• 14. Mount Sinai Hospital, New York
• 15. Hospitals of the University of Pennsylvania-Penn Presbyterian, Philadelphia
• 16. Mayo Clinic-Phoenix
• 17. Rush University Medical Center, Chicago
• 18. Barnes-Jewish Hospital, Saint Louis (tie)
• 18. Keck Medical Center of USC, Los Angeles (tie)
• 20. Houston Methodist Hospital

The 16 specialties that hospitals were ranked for are: cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, ear, nose and throat, gastroenterology and GI surgery, geriatrics, gynecology, nephrology, neurology and neurosurgery, ophthalmology, orthopedics, psychiatry, pulmonology and lung surgery, rehabilitation, rheumatology and urology.

This year, the U.S. News rankings are accompanied by their “Hospital Heroes” project, a series of profiles highlighting more than 60 health care heroes from across the country.

“Our Hospital Heroes series is a tribute to recognizing individuals at urban and rural hospitals in communities across the country who have gone above and beyond during this unparalleled time in history,” Harder said.

Methodology

U.S. News & World Report said the 2020-21 rankings evaluated nearly every community hospital in America. Only 134 hospitals out of over 4,500 were ranked in one specialty, while 563 hospitals were ranked among the best regional hospitals. A hospital was ranked regionally based on its performance in delivering complex and common care, U.S. News said. The rankings are jointly produced by U.S. News and RTI International, a North Carolina-based research organization. (Read the full U.S. News best hospitals methodology.)

City News Service contributed to this report.