Make Your Voice Heard on U.S. News "Best Hospitals" Rankings

Physician survey voting platform opens

UH Clinical Update - January 2018

By Cliff Megerian, MD, FACS, President, University Hospitals Physician Services

It’s an established fact – University Hospitals physicians are proud to work here. You told us this through our recent physician survey, noting your feeling of pride in UH and in the level of care delivered here.

And it is you, our providers, who make this a great institution. Each year, the rankings from U.S. News & World Report reflect that to some degree. But you may not know that you actually have some control over how well we do. As UH physicians, you have the opportunity to vote and affect the rankings in several specialties, and through that, the ranking of our system as a whole. Physicians’ votes measuring reputation – paired with data analytics – determine where we place in the rankings.

First, a little history. For many years, the U.S. News & World Report rankings were based on the votes of a small group of physicians scattered around the U.S. Today, the process is vastly different. Board-certified physicians who belong to Doximity.com cast votes for their own specialty – and that can dramatically affect how we are ranked nationally. For example, our ENT department now ranks 12th in the nation due not only the quality of care, but as a result of our ENT physicians’ confidence, which is reflected in their votes.

This isn’t widely known, but there are hospital systems that have an entire staff dedicated solely to the marketing of physicians around the U.S. News & World Report. We do not. We put our resources into medicine, not marketing. We earn our ratings, and that’s what makes us great.

So if you feel the care delivered in your department is excellent, let’s give ourselves credit for that. It’s important. Part of our reputation as a national leader in clinical care comes from UH Cleveland Medical Center’s strong standing in U.S. News & World Report’s annual “Best Hospitals” rankings.

The 2018 U.S. News survey will soon be open to board-certified physicians in 16 adult and 10 pediatric specialties who are members of Doximity. U.S. News ranks adult hospitals in cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, ENT, gastroenterology and GI surgery, geriatrics, gynecology, nephrology, neurology and neurosurgery, ophthalmology, orthopedics, psychiatry, pulmonology, rehabilitation, rheumatology and urology. It also ranks children’s hospitals in cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, gastroenterology and GI surgery, neonatology, nephrology, neurology, and neurosurgery, orthopedics, pulmonology and urology.

If you are board-certified in one of the relevant specialties and are registered on Doximity, we urge you to complete the U.S. News survey and spread the word about the excellent clinical care provided at UH Cleveland Medical Center.

2018-19 Best Children’s Hospitals and Best Hospitals Physician Survey Key dates are as follows:

• January 3- February 28, 2018 – Pediatric Hospital survey is in the field
• Week of January 15, 2018 – Paper physician survey will be distributed to each sample of eligible physicians 
• Late February, 2018 – Doximity physician survey will be released to eligible physicians

UH has long been known as a compassionate caregiver – our patients tell us that. But if you talk to physicians around the country, they will tell you that our care is also of the highest-quality, and that is perhaps not as well-known as it should be.

I hope you find this information compelling. If you do – and you are confident in the quality of care your UH specialty provides - please log on to Doximity.com and vote.

Compassionate care and the trust of physicians creates the backbone of our success. Let’s make sure that this is known throughout the country.