September 21, 2017
2 min read

STS News, Summer 2016 -- Institutions participating in STS Public Reporting Online for adult cardiac surgery soon will receive extra credit in U.S. News & World Report’s rankings of best hospitals.

The publication recently updated the methodology for its Best Hospitals in Cardiology & Heart Surgery rankings to include a maximum of three points for hospitals that publicly report via both STS.org and the American College of Cardiology’s National Cardiovascular Data Registry. Hospitals that report via just one outlet will receive two points, and hospitals that do not participate in either will receive no credit.

“Our goal in reporting on provider performance is to assist patients in making informed health care decisions,” said Ben Harder, Chief of Health Analysis at U.S. News. “STS’s analyses yield important, high-quality data that can benefit the patients who use our decision support tools. But that information is only available to patients and the public if STS participants choose to voluntarily report it.”

"Our goal in reporting on provider performance is to assist patients in making informed health care decisions."

Ben Harder

Previously, U.S. News awarded hospitals credit in the publication’s Heart Bypass Surgery ratings for publicly reporting their isolated coronary artery bypass grafting outcomes via STS.org. The amount of credit  given was based on both the fact that a hospital publicly reported and how well the institution performed. U.S. News will continue to allocate credit in this way for the Heart Bypass Surgery ratings.

The new credit for the Cardiology & Heart Surgery rankings is based just on the fact that the institution reports, not what its score is.

“That’s because STS.org reports ratings for hospitals in three different procedures, none of which is an exact match with the inclusion criteria we use for our Cardiology & Heart Surgery analysis,” Harder said. “We want more clinician input before we decide on whether and how to assign relative weights in our Cardiology & Heart Surgery rankings to each of STS’s publicly reported measures.”

U.S. News reviewed the STS website in late February to gather information for its analysis. The updated Cardiology & Heart Surgery rankings are expected to be published in early August. 

Institutions that do not currently participate in STS Public Reporting Online can ensure that they receive credit in the 2017 U.S. News rankings by signing up before mid-October.