Thursday, September 13, 2007


(click for a larger view)


Time Course (2005-2007) of University of Minnesota Hospital
Specialty Rankings by US News

Because of limitations of Blogger in handling tables, a link to a pdf of the document is also provided.

The spin doctors always seem to manage to make each year's ranking look like an improvement, and this year is no exception. However, the jaundiced eye might look at the above trends and come to other conclusions.

The number of specialties in which BigU's hospital is ranked in the top fifty has declined from last year. The number of outstanding programs, highlighted in yellow, is three. The number of good programs numbers six. And the number of programs that are of concern is eight. Some of these would seem to need improvement given our state's population, e.g., orthopedics, rheumatology, geriatrics, rehabilitation, psychiatry, ophthalmology, and gulp, pediatrics.

The first step to improvement is to admit that you have a need for it. This seems to be difficult in a state where all the children are above average.

This stuff matters. See Atul Gawande's "The Bell Curve" wherein BigU hospital gets an "attaboy" for outstanding work in cystic fibrosis.

Ciao,

Bonzo

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