Ten of the University Medical Center's 36 clinical departments made U.S. News & World Report's 2002 "America's Best Hospitals" list. Medical Center officials are proud of the achievement but said they are skeptical of the ranking's bias toward better-known hospitals, which may have shortchanged the Center's scores.
Endocrinology Department Chief Jerry Nadler, whose division ranked fifth, said the Medical Center's endocrinology programs are "continuing to gain in strength and reputation based on the outstanding physicians and faculty that we have in the division."
He added that with "outstanding recruitment in the diabetes area in the past couple years" and an osteoporosis expert joining the department in the fall, "we look forward to continuing to do well and even better" in rankings.
U.S. News used a three-part ordering method that combined hospital reputation, mortality ratio and care-related factors such as registered nurse-to-patient ratio, available technological services and the presence of cancer, trauma or palliative care centers.
The weekly newsmagazine collected data from over 6,000 hospitals, of which only 1,958 were found eligible for their ranking methodology as teaching hospitals, medical school affiliates or providers of nine out of 17 prescribed technological services.
But both Nadler and Tim Garson, vice president and Medical School Dean, pointed to subjectivity in the often-quoted "America's Best Hospitals" list. Much of the ranking is "on reputation rather than objective data," Garson said. The Medical Center scored high in the nurse-to-patient ratio and technological services and maintained a low mortality rate, but with low marks in reputation it was relegated to lower positions on the lists.
For example, the endocrinology department had a higher nurse-to-patient ratio and lower mortality rate than the four hospitals ranked above it, as well as the highest possible score in technological services. But despite these strengths, the hospital ranked fifth because it lacks the reputation of hospitals like Johns Hopkins or the renowned Mayo clinic.
The department had a reputation score only one-third of Johns Hopkins and less than one-fifth that of the Mayo clinic.
"Reputation scores are the slowest to change either in a positive or negative direction," Garson said. He spoke of increased marketing of the Medical Center's accomplishments as a way to make its name better known across the country. "Our job is to get better and to tell everyone we're better," he said. "Part of that is fact, part of it is communication, and we need to do both."
In neurology and neurosurgery, the University Medical Center ranked 14th; ear, nose and throat, 19th; urology, 20th; orthopedics, 21st; cancer, 22nd; gynecology, 25th; digestive disorders, 28th; respiratory disorders, 31st; kidney disease, 41st.
In addition, Martha Jefferson Hospital, a local hospital in Charlottesville, made the top 50 hospitals for the first time for its treatment of respiratory disorders. Garson said that there is "a lot of interaction" between the University and the newly ranked community hospital, and added, "In areas that make sense, we probably should have even more"
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