National Benchmark Study

Data Source
MedPAR Limited Data Set (LDS) files obtained from Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) with 2,959 hospitals 11M+ inpatient records
MedPAR Data Exclusion 
Specialty hospitals (critical access, children’s, women’s, psychiatric, substance abuse, rehabilitation, cardiac, orthopedic, heart, cancer, and long-term acute care)
Federally owned hospitals
Non-US hospitals (such as those in Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands)
Hospitals with fewer than 25 acute care beds
Hospitals with fewer than 100 Medicare patient discharges in the current data year
Hospitals with Medicare average LOS longer than 25 days in the current data year
Hospitals with no reported Medicare patient deaths in the current data year
Hospitals for which a current year Medicare Cost Report was not available
Patients who were discharged to another short- term facility (done to avoid double- counting)
Patients who were not at least 65 years old
Rehabilitation, psychiatric, and substance abuse patients
Patients with stays shorter than one day
Peer Group Methodology
Major teaching hospitals
400 more acute care beds in service and a resident-per-bed ratio of at least 0.25, or
250 more acute care beds in service and a resident-per-bed ratio of at least 0.55.
Teaching hospitals
200 or more acute care beds in service and a resident-per-bed ratio of at least 0.03.
Large community hospitals
250 or more acute care beds in service and not classified as a teaching hospital per the definition above.
Medium community hospitals
100 to 249 acute care beds in service and not classified as a teaching hospital per
the definition above.
Small community hospitals
25 to 99 acute care beds in service.
Expected Value Methodology
Expected values for readmission rate, complication rate, length of stay, and mortality rate are calculated in the Vizient Southeast Performance Database, grouped by MS-DRG and Patient Age Group.
Results

Hospital Peer Group

Measure Name

Mean Index*

Top Decile Index*

Small Community

Average Length of Stay

0.84

0.64

Small Community

Complications Index

0.93

0.19

Small Community

Mortality Index

0.84

0.18

Medium Community

Average Length of Stay

0.92

0.77

Medium Community

Complications Index

0.94

0.45

Medium Community

Mortality Index

0.96

0.57

Large Community

Average Length of Stay

0.96

0.82

Large Community

Complications Index

0.93

0.54

Large Community

Mortality Index

1.00

0.69

Teaching

Average Length of Stay

0.98

0.84

Teaching

Complications Index

0.98

0.61

Teaching

Mortality Index

1.02

0.66

Major Teaching

Average Length of Stay

1.09

0.96

Major Teaching

Complications Index

1.16

0.89

Major Teaching

Mortality Index

1.06

0.82

* Index = Observed Rate / Expected Rate