CMS reports of hospital mistakes now available online

U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) has released  inspection reports for hospitals nationwide from the past two years. The release was in response to requests from the Association of Health Care Journalists, which has compiled them into a searchable database available to the public at http://www.hospitalinspections.org/. CMS collects the reports for all hospitals that receive payments from Medicare or Medicaid (includes all hospitals except Veterans Administration hospitals). In addition to complaint investigations, the CMS requires routine inspections of hospitals every three to four years. The agency does not release those reports.