2 Bucks Co. Hospitals Make U.S. News Rankings

BUCKS COUNTY, PA — Two Bucks County hospitals have been ranked among the top in Pennsylvania by U.S. News & World Report. The publication released it 2019-20 rankings this week.

Doylestown Hospital came in 13th in Pennsylvania and St. Mary Medical Center came in 18th.

Doylestown Hospital earned “High Performing” ratings for aortic valve surgery, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), heart bypass surgery, heart failure, hip and knee replacement and lung cancer surgery. Doylestown Hospital is also cited as “excellent” in patient experience for abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve surgery, heart bypass surgery and lung cancer surgery.

St. Mary earned "High Performing" in four specialties, including Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), heart failure, hip replacement and knee replacement. It was also cited as being "excellent" in discharging patients.

The hospital rankings for 2019-20 include the honor roll, top ranked hospitals in 12 specialty categories, and the top ranked hospitals by state and metro region. In Pennsylvania, two hospitals made the honor roll and 26 hospitals, including Doylestown Hospital, were on the state's best hospitals list.

The Pennsylvania hospitals on the honor roll were UPMC Presbyterian Shadyside in Pittsburgh and Hospitals of the University of Pennsylvania-Penn Presbyterian in Philadelphia.

“The pursuit of excellence is never ending at Doylestown Health,” said Jim Brexler, President and CEO. “In order to remain among the best in care delivery, we are transforming our facilities, campus and the entire health system with a singular vision for the future, offering members of our community access to the most clinically-advanced care available, in a familiar setting close to home.”

For the 2019-20 rankings and ratings, U.S. News evaluated more than 4,500 medical centers nationwide in 25 specialties, procedures and conditions. In rankings by state and metro area, U.S. News recognized hospitals as high performing across multiple areas of care.

This year, the rankings of the best hospitals come with an updated methodology that emphasizes two new patient-centric measures, according to the publication.

"We use a number of different measures to assess hospital quality and we separately assess each hospital in many different specialties and services that hospitals offer," Ben Harder, managing editor and chief of health analysis at U.S. News told Patch.

Across the 12 specialty rankings — which cover categories like cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, and nephrology — U.S. News & World added two new measures that are patient centered: patient outcome and patient experience.

"In each of those areas, we are now assessing how successful a hospital is at sending patients home," Harder said. The rankings now look at whether after receiving care, patients end up going home or require further care at a rehab facility or even at a different hospital.

"That's an important outcome for patients," Harder said. "Patients do want to be home recovering and spending time with their families."

However, the methodology adjusts for how sick a patient was when they were admitted to the hospital so that hospitals that admit sicker patients are not penalized in the rankings.

The second patient-centered measure added to the methodology is patient experience. Data from a federally mandated survey was used to assess this measure, according to U.S. News. The survey covers topics like how good doctors and nurses were at communicating with patients and how well a patient understood how to take care of themselves after leaving the hospital.

"So that patient experience dimension is one that we added to our specialty rankings this year, and obviously that's important for patients too because they not only want to get good care and have a good outcome but also feel that what mattered to them was considered and taken into account in the care they got," Harder said.

You can see the full Pennsylvania rankings here.