2016 U.S. News & World Report Rankings: A message to Physicians and Staff Members of The Johns Hopkins Hospital

To the Johns Hopkins Hospital community

Dear Colleagues:

I am delighted to have this opportunity as president of The Johns Hopkins Hospital to express my profound thanks for all the hard, dedicated and exceptional work you perform on behalf of our patients—an unequaled effort that has led U.S. News & World Report to rank us (yet again!) as one of the top hospitals in the nation.

Remarkably, the 2016 U.S. News Best Hospitals rankings has eight of our specialties receiving higher rankings than they did in 2015. These eight increased from between one and 11 places over what they had been in last year's survey. Indeed, 10 of our specialties now are among the top five in the nation—another improvement over last year—and 14 of them are in the top 10.  That's spectacular.

As you know, we were ranked the #1 hospital in the country for 22 years—21 of them consecutively. That's a record no other hospital will ever equal—at least for many years to come. We owe that unparalleled achievement entirely to the magnificent jobs that you all do in caring for our patients. Although in the past few years we've seen other fine hospitals rise to place a few spots ahead of us in these U.S. News rankings, the important point to recognize is that we haven't changed. The quality of the care we provide remains exemplary. What has changed is the way U.S. News conducts its survey and calculates its findings.

We are working with U.S. News & World Report to address what we believe—and to some extent, it also recognizes—are methods that might inaccurately place some hospitals at a disadvantage in the rankings.

For example, U.S. News continues to develop its rankings based on general data about patient care that it obtains from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). Even CMS has said that's a problem when it comes to assessing the quality of Maryland hospitals, since Johns Hopkins and all of the other hospitals in this state have a unique payment arrangement with an independent state agency, the Health Services Cost Review Commission (HSCRC). We are required to send only limited data to CMS while providing far more detailed data to the HSCRC.

So far, U.S. News has made some adjustments. It used Maryland-specific data for its patient safety calculation this year. 

In working with U.S. News, we simply are trying to make sure that the exceptional work of our nation's top hospitals is properly assessed and recognized.

I want to emphasize, however, that the most important part of our work is not reflected in our public rankings, ratings or gold stars—but in how we make our patients feel every day, ensuring that each one of them personally experiences the extraordinary quality of the care we provide thanks to all that you do. That is what really counts.

Sincerely,

Redonda Miller, M.D., M.B.A.
President, The Johns Hopkins Hospital