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Researchers tout use of Yelp reviews of hospitals

 

A new Manhattan Institute paper  examines the correlation between Yelp reviews of New York State hospitals and objective measures of hospital quality.  The researchers say that the Yelp scores are an accurate composite measure of hospital quality even though some providers say that they’re leery of such hospital rankings because, the skeptics say, they  don’t account for the fact that some institutions  care for sicker patient populations than others. The basic metric used is potentially preventable hospital readmissions.

The  researchers said hospitals can use  and respond to social-media measuring systems to better build their business while helping consumers more expertly navigate the world’s most complicated healthcare system.

“By disseminating neutral, clear signals about basic hospital quality, social media tools can also improve the ability of higher-quality hospitals to compete to attract market share, leading to more lives saved and more costs avoided for patients, taxpayers and employers,” they write.

They recommend:

  1. “Help make Yelp scores and reviews more visible when consumers are making important decisions about healthcare coverage—for instance, when choosing among competing insurers’ hospital networks on New York State’s health-insurance exchange.
  2. “Link objective, simple quality metrics onto the Yelp review page for hospitals to allow patients with specific concerns to access more detailed information that would complement and better inform Yelp quality ratings.
  3. “Fund targeted “hackathons” that find ways to make Yelp and other social media reviews more accessible to high-needs, vulnerable populations—including caregivers for the frail, elderly, non-English-speaking, or low-income minority populations.”

To read the Manhattan Institute paper, please hit this link.

 


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