Hospitals that make their data hard to find

One of the most important things to know about a hospital is how many of its patients develop central-line bloodstream infections. But many hospitals don't release that information, even though all can do so if they choose. To help motivate them, we put together a list of leading academic hospitals—facilities that should know better—that don't make information on central-line bloodstream infections easily accessible.

"The best hospitals know that sunlight is the best disinfectant, so they are willing to publicly report even if their performance is not yet optimal," said Leah Binder, chief executive officer of The Leapfrog Group, a nonprofit organization that focuses on improving health care in hospitals, in part by encouraging them to report information on infections and other measures.

The table below includes teaching hospitals (excluding Veterans Administration hospitals) that aren't required to provide their data to state-run databases and haven't voluntarily released the information to Leapfrog. The list is arranged alphabetically by state.

You can also use our hospital Ratings to see how well hospitals in your area performed in preventing bloodstream infections. If a hospital doesn't have a Rating in that measure, in means either that they haven't reported the information, or reported it in way that we couldn't use. For those hospitals, you should ask hospitals directly for the information. If they can't or won't give it to you, either no one is keeping track or they don't think you need to know—neither of which is a good sign.