Hospitals' star ratings and clinical outcomes: ecological study

摘要

The English Department of Health is developing global measures of the performance of all NHS bodies, including 166 acute hospital trusts. Since 2000-1, the trusts get zero, one, two, or three stars to indicate performance.1 This rating may not reflect the effectiveness of clinical care measured in patient outcomes because of the lack of accurate routine data.2 One exception is in adult critical care3; we checked whether a hospital's rating provided an indication of its clinical outcomes.