Find That Hospital

Methodology

Every number, date, and label on Find That Hospital comes from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ public Provider Data Catalog (data.cms.gov) — the same data behind medicare.gov’s Care Compare. We never invent, estimate, or “fix” a value. When CMS doesn’t report something, we say “Not reported” — or show CMS’s own stated reason for the blank. The national comparison numbers are CMS’s published averages, and the better/no-different/worse-than-national categories are CMS’s own words, shown verbatim — never our judgment.

The hospital star is a national comparison.CMS’s overall hospital rating (1–5 stars) summarizes a hospital’s reported measures against a single national standard — unlike nursing-home stars, which are curved within each state. We say which basis applies wherever a star appears. When CMS doesn’t publish a star (common for small, specialty, psychiatric, and newer hospitals), we show CMS’s footnote and never treat the absence as a judgment.

The datasets

CMS refreshes hospital data periodically; this site rebuilds from the latest files. Current data last updated: April 28, 2026 · patient-survey collection period: 07/01/2024 to 06/30/2025. Individual measures span their own reporting periods, shown per section on each hospital page. CMS data itself lags reality — measures reflect past periods of care, not this week’s.

Which measures we show (and which we don’t)

The raw CMS files carry more measures than a person choosing a hospital can honestly weigh, so each hospital page shows a curated set: the six condition-specific death rates plus the hospital-wide mortality measure, hip/knee complication rate, the two patient-safety composites (PSI-04, PSI-90), all six infection ratios, the six condition-specific readmission rates plus hospital-wide readmission, and five timely-care measures (ER time, left-before-being-seen, sepsis care, staff flu vaccination, ED volume), plus eight HCAHPS survey items with the survey summary star.

Deliberately not shown (all available at medicare.gov/care-compare): the individual PSI sub-measures (the PSI-90 composite covers them), the “excess days” (EDAC) measures — their unit, days per 100 discharges, can be negative and doesn’t fit an honest table next to percentages — outpatient chemotherapy/colonoscopy/surgery visit measures, HAI supporting counts (device days, predicted/observed cases, confidence limits), and condition-specific process measures (stroke, blood clot, malnutrition, and sepsis sub-bundles). Omission is a readability choice, never a signal about any hospital.

What each number means

The overall hospital rating

CMS rolls a hospital's reported measures — deaths, safety of care, readmissions, patient experience, and timely & effective care — into one star rating from 1 to 5. Two things matter about how it's built. First, the comparison is national: every hospital in the country is held to the same standard. That's different from nursing-home stars, which are curved within each state — so a 4-star hospital in Alabama and a 4-star hospital in Oregon met the same bar. Second, it's a summary: hospitals report different numbers of measures, and a hospital strong in one area and weak in another can land on the same star as one that's steady everywhere. Some hospitals — often small, specialty, psychiatric, or new ones — don't report enough measures to get a star at all, and CMS says why in a footnote.

What to do with this: use the star as a starting point, then read the sections below to see which parts are strong and which are weak — the star can't tell you that.

Where the rating comes from (CMS's measure counts)

Alongside the star itself, CMS publishes the ingredients: how many measures the hospital reported in each group (deaths, safety, readmissions, patient experience, timely & effective care), and for the first three, how many of those measures came out better than, no different than, or worse than the national rate. These counts are CMS's own categorization, shown here exactly as published. They're the fastest honest way to see where a star came from.

What to do with this: scan for groups with any 'worse than national' count, then find those measures in the sections below and bring them up with the care team.

The HCAHPS patient survey

After discharge, a random sample of each hospital's adult patients gets the same standardized survey: did nurses and doctors communicate well, was pain addressed, were medicines explained, was the room clean and quiet, would you recommend this place. The numbers shown are 'top-box' percentages — the share of patients who gave the most positive answer, like 'always'. CMS also publishes a summary star for the survey itself. Patient experience isn't the same thing as clinical quality, but it correlates with it, and it's the only measure here that comes straight from the people in the beds.

What to do with this: compare each percentage to the national average shown beside it, and weigh the survey by its size — the response count and rate are listed right below.

When survey scores are 'Not reported'

Not every patient is surveyed, and not everyone responds — response rates around 20–25% are typical. When too few patients complete the survey, CMS suppresses the scores and shows a footnote instead of a number; that footnote is CMS's own wording, shown here verbatim. A hospital with 'Not reported' survey scores is not a bad hospital — it's usually small, new, or treats patients the survey doesn't cover (like children's or psychiatric hospitals).

What to do with this: trust bigger survey counts more, and never read a blank as a bad sign — it isn't one.

What risk adjustment means

A hospital that takes the hardest cases will lose more patients than one that doesn't — that's arithmetic, not quality. So CMS risk-adjusts these measures: each hospital's rate is adjusted for how old and how sick its patients were, so that what's left reflects care, not case mix. It isn't perfect — no adjustment fully captures how sick someone is — but it means a big-city trauma center and a small community hospital can be compared more fairly than raw numbers would allow.

What to do with this: read the rates as adjusted comparisons, not raw odds — and put the most weight on CMS's better/worse-than-national category, which accounts for the statistical uncertainty too.

CMS's better/no-different/worse categories

For most safety and outcome measures, CMS doesn't just publish a number — it tests whether the hospital's result is statistically better than, no different than, or worse than the national rate, and publishes that category. 'No different' is the honest middle: most hospitals land there on most measures. 'Number of cases too small' means CMS couldn't reliably tell either way. This site shows CMS's category word-for-word and never invents its own verdicts — when you see 'Worse than the national rate' on this page, that's CMS's math, not our opinion.

What to do with this: treat 'better' and 'worse' as CMS's statistically meaningful flags, and treat 'no different' as exactly that — not a hidden good or bad.

Death & complication measures

For conditions like heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, COPD, stroke, and bypass surgery, CMS tracks the share of Medicare patients who died within 30 days of admission — wherever the death occurred, in the hospital or after discharge. The rates are risk-adjusted for how sick each hospital's patients were, and each comes with CMS's better/no-different/worse-than-national category. The hospital-wide measure rolls all causes together. The complication measures work the same way: serious avoidable problems after procedures like hip or knee replacement.

What to do with this: look first at the condition that matters to your situation — if you're going in for heart surgery, the CABG line matters more than the composite.

Infection ratios (SIR)

Hospitals track infections patients pick up during care and report them to the CDC. The number shown is a standardized infection ratio (SIR): observed infections divided by the number predicted for a hospital of that size and type. An SIR of 1 means about as many as predicted; 0.5 means half; 2 means double. Because small numbers bounce around, CMS also publishes whether each SIR is statistically better, no different, or worse than the national benchmark — that category is the more reliable signal, and it's shown here verbatim.

What to do with this: put more weight on the category than the raw ratio, and ask any hospital how visitors and family can help with infection precautions — good teams love that question.

CLABSI

A central line is a catheter placed in a large vein, common in ICUs. Because it runs straight to the bloodstream, germs on it cause serious, largely preventable infections. Hospitals prevent CLABSI with strict insertion checklists, daily line reviews, and removing lines as soon as they're not needed.

What to do with this: if your person has a central line, it's fair to ask each day whether it's still needed — that one question mirrors what good hospitals already do.

CAUTI

Urinary catheters are common during surgery and serious illness, and the longer one stays in, the higher the infection risk. Hospitals prevent CAUTI by using catheters only when needed and removing them promptly.

What to do with this: ask whether a catheter is still necessary each day it's in — prompt removal is the main prevention.

Surgical site infections

Surgical site infections happen where the body was opened, from skin-level to deep tissue. CMS publicly reports them for two tracer operations — colon surgery and abdominal hysterectomy — because they're common enough to measure reliably. Prevention lives in the details: antibiotics timed right before the incision, sterile technique, warming, glucose control, and wound care after.

What to do with this: before a planned surgery, ask what the team does to prevent surgical infections and what warning signs to watch for at home.

MRSA

MRSA is a strain of staph that standard antibiotics don't kill, which makes bloodstream infections with it dangerous and harder to treat. Hospitals fight it with hand hygiene, screening, isolation when needed, and careful device care.

What to do with this: the single best defense is hand hygiene — it is always okay to ask anyone entering the room, gently, whether they've cleaned their hands.

C. diff

Clostridioides difficile causes serious diarrhea and gut inflammation, usually after antibiotics have cleared out the normal gut bacteria that keep it in check. It spreads by spores that survive on surfaces, so cleaning and hand-washing with soap and water (sanitizer doesn't kill the spores) matter enormously. It's one of the most common hospital-acquired infections nationwide.

What to do with this: ask whether every antibiotic your person is on is still needed — unnecessary antibiotics are C. diff's best friend.

Readmissions

Being back in a hospital within a month of discharge is sometimes unavoidable — but high readmission rates can reflect discharges that happened too fast, instructions that didn't stick, or follow-up that fell through. CMS tracks 30-day readmissions for specific conditions and hospital-wide, risk-adjusts them, and categorizes each against the national rate. For a caregiver, this measure is personal: readmissions are the revolving door you're trying to avoid.

What to do with this: before discharge, ask for the written plan — medicines reconciled, follow-up appointment booked, a phone number for questions, and the warning signs that mean 'call now'.

Timely & effective care

These measures track how the hospital's processes actually run. ER time is the median minutes patients spent in the emergency department before leaving; 'left before being seen' is the share who gave up waiting. Sepsis care measures how often patients with severe sepsis or septic shock got every step of the recommended treatment bundle — sepsis is a leading cause of hospital death, and the bundle is time-critical. Staff flu vaccination protects patients who can't afford to catch it. CMS publishes these as plain numbers without a better/worse category, so the national average is shown beside each for context — the comparison is yours to make.

What to do with this: ER numbers matter most if you'll actually use this ER — for a planned admission, weigh the sepsis and vaccination numbers more.

Emergency department volume

CMS labels each emergency department by how many visits it handles per year. It's context, not quality — a 'very high' volume ER sees more of everything (and often has more specialists on hand) but may also have longer waits; a 'low' volume ER may be faster but transfer complex cases elsewhere.

What to do with this: read the ER wait times in light of the volume — and if your person has a complex condition, ask whether this ER typically treats it or transfers it.

Emergency services

Some hospitals — especially specialty, psychiatric, and some surgical hospitals — don't run an emergency department at all. That's a design choice, not a deficiency, but it matters practically: it changes where an ambulance would take your person, and it can mean complications after a procedure get handled somewhere else.

What to do with this: if this hospital shows no emergency services, ask where its patients go when something goes wrong after hours — and how far that is from you.

Ownership types

CMS records each hospital's ownership type. Researchers have studied differences between for-profit and nonprofit hospital care for decades, and ownership does shape incentives — but it doesn't determine any single hospital's quality. There are excellent and poor hospitals in every category. The measures on this page are a far better guide to this hospital than its label.

What to do with this: note it, then judge the hospital on its numbers and your own conversations — not the label.

Medicare certification

Every hospital on this site is Medicare-certified, which requires meeting federal conditions of participation and periodic review. Certification is a floor, not a rating — it means the hospital may operate and bill Medicare, not that it performs well. Newer hospitals often show 'Not Available' on many measures simply because they haven't reported long enough.

What to do with this: treat certification as the entry ticket. The star, survey, and measures are how you compare one hospital to another.

Why a value can be blank (CMS footnotes)

When CMS suppresses or omits a value, it publishes a footnote code. We show the meaning in place of the blank, taken verbatim from CMS’s official Footnote Crosswalk (y9us-9xdf):

CodeMeaning
1The number of cases/patients is too few to report.
2Data submitted were based on a sample of cases/patients.
3Results are based on a shorter time period than required.
4Data suppressed by CMS for one or more quarters.
5Results are not available for this reporting period.
6Fewer than 100 patients completed the CAHPS survey. Use these scores with caution, as the number of surveys may be too low to reliably assess facility performance.
7No cases met the criteria for this measure.
8The lower limit of the confidence interval cannot be calculated if the number of observed infections equals zero.
9No data are available from the state/territory for this reporting period.
10Very few patients were eligible for the CAHPS survey. The scores shown reflect fewer than 50 completed surveys. Use these scores with caution, as the number of surveys may be too low to reliably assess facility performance.
11There were discrepancies in the data collection process.
12This measure does not apply to this hospital for this reporting period.
13Results cannot be calculated for this reporting period.
14The results for this state are combined with nearby states to protect confidentiality.
15The number of cases/patients is too few to report a star rating.
16There are too few measures or measure groups reported to calculate a star rating or measure group score.
17This hospital's star rating only includes data reported on inpatient services.
18This result is not based on performance data; the hospital did not submit data and did not submit an HAI exemption form.
19Data are shown only for hospitals that participate in the Inpatient Quality Reporting (IQR) and Outpatient Quality Reporting (OQR) programs.
20State and national averages do not include Veterans Health Administration (VHA) hospital data.
21Patient survey results for Veterans Health Administration (VHA) hospitals do not represent official HCAHPS results and are not included in state and national averages.
22Overall star ratings are not calculated for Department of Defense (DoD) hospitals.
23The data are based on claims that the hospital or facility submitted to CMS. The hospital or facility has reported discrepancies in their claims data.
24Results for this Veterans Health Administration (VHA) hospital are combined with those from the VHA administrative parent hospital that manages all points of service.
25State and national averages include Veterans Health Administration (VHA) hospital data.
26State and national averages include Department of Defense (DoD) hospital data.
28The results are based on the hospital or facility's data submissions. CMS approved the hospital or facility's Extraordinary Circumstances Exception request suggesting that results may be impacted.
29This measure was calculated using partial performance period data due to a CMS-approved exception.
aMaryland hospitals are waived from receiving payment adjustments under the Program.
*For Maryland hospitals, no data are available to calculate a PSI 90 measure result; therefore, no performance decile or points are assigned for Domain 1 and the Total HAC score is dependent on the Domain 2 score.
**This value was calculated using data reported by the hospital in compliance with the requirements outlined for this program and does not take into account information that became available at a later date.

What this data can’t tell you

Attribution

Data: Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (data.cms.gov), public domain, last updated April 28, 2026. Find That Hospital is not affiliated with CMS, Medicare, or any government agency. Found an error? Suggest a correction.

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