The Lown Institute Hospitals Index released the first ranking that examines the racial inclusivity of over 3,200 U.S. hospitals to assess their success at serving the people of color living in their communities.
To create the rankings, the Institute assessed how well the demographics of a hospital’s Medicare patients matched the demographics of the hospital’s surrounding communities. Hospitals underserving communities of color got lower rankings. Some of the most and least racially inclusive U.S. hospitals are located in the same cities.
Additional ranking information, including an explanation of methods, is available at LownHospitalsIndex.org/inclusivity. A launch of the full 2021 Lown Institute Hospitals Index, including rankings across more than 50 metrics, will take place at the end of June.
Findings include:
- Racial segregation is common in urban hospital markets. Many major cities have a high proportion of hospitals at each end of the inclusivity rankings.
- The most and least inclusive hospitals serve very different patient populations. In the top 50 most inclusive hospitals, people of color made up 61 percent of patients on average, compared to 17 percent at the bottom 50 hospitals.
- Many elite hospitals performed poorly on racial inclusivity. Among the 20 US News Honor Roll hospitals, 11 ranked in the bottom third for racial inclusivity. Five hospitals ranked in the top third.
Read more:
- Lown Institute: 2021 Winning Hospitals: Racial Inclusivity