CalHospitalCompare.org

How We Rate Quality on This Website

At CalHospitalCompare.org, we rate hospitals on quality measures that affect health care, so you can compare hospitals. Here are examples of some of the measures that you'll see on this website and why they matter:

• Appropriate timing of antibiotic. Getting an antibiotic within one hour prior to surgery reduces the risk of wound infections. Hospitals should make sure surgery patients get antibiotics at the right time.
   
• Hospital-acquired pressure ulcers. Pressure ulcers, also called bedsores, are areas of damaged skin caused by lying in one position for too long. This measure shows the percentage of patients who acquired pressure ulcers (stage two or higher) after going into the hospital.
   
• Aspirin given at arrival to cardiac patients. Aspirin can help keep blood clots from forming and reduces the risk of death for a patient having a heart attack.
   
• Bilateral cardiac catheterization. Cardiac catheterization is a procedure that tests if blood vessels to the heart are narrowed or blocked, which could cause a heart attack. Most people need the test only on the left side of the heart near the major pumping chamber. The test should be performed on the right side for only a small number of reasons, such as heart valve disease. This indicator reports the proportion of patients who received heart catheterization on both sides of the heart.
   
• Breastfeeding rate. This rate indicates what percentage of newborns were being breastfed exclusively upon discharge. Although there are many reasons breastfeeding rates vary, it is good practice for hospital staff to help new mothers begin to breastfeed before they leave the hospital.
   
• Transition to home. The care that patients get after leaving the hospital is important to their recovery. Patients were asked whether doctors and nurses talked with them about arranging needed care after leaving the hospital, and whether they received, in writing, information about which symptoms or health problems to watch for.
   

Does it surprise you to hear about some of these practices? You can't expect to know everything that goes on in a hospital. You just need to ask about what matters to you.