MedPAC Questions Validity Of CMS Hospital Star Ratings

On September 22, 2016, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) sent a letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) questioning the validity of the new hospital star rating system. Medicare released the new ratings on July 27, 2016 for 3,662 of the 4,599 general acute care hospitals in the United States. MedPAC said its analysis of the system found that the rating criteria were not evenly applied.

The ratings are a summary score calculated using a weighted average of seven quality measure groups: mortality (7 measures), readmissions (8 measures), safety of care (8 measures), patient . . .