PlainHospital is a free informational resource that makes public CMS Hospital Compare, FDA, and VA data easier to read. It is not medical advice and does not certify any hospital as safe or unsafe. Use it as a starting point for your own research, not as the final word on where to seek care.

Informational only, not medical advice

Nothing on PlainHospital constitutes medical, clinical, or professional advice, and using the site does not create any professional relationship. Decisions about where to have a procedure, which hospital to choose, or how to act on a quality measure can have real health consequences. For guidance about your care, consult a qualified physician or your insurer. For official hospital quality information, rely on Medicare Care Compare directly. In a medical emergency, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room — do not use this site to decide whether to seek emergency care.

What hospital quality data is, and is not

The star ratings and quality measures on PlainHospital are summary statistics reported to CMS, not a guarantee of the care any individual patient will receive. A hospital's overall rating is a composite that depends on which measures it reported and on case mix, and a higher star count does not mean every department or procedure performs the same way. Patient experience (HCAHPS) scores reflect the patients who responded to a survey, not every patient. Infection and mortality rates are risk-adjusted estimates pooled over a reporting window, not a real-time count. Device adverse-event reports in FDA MAUDE are self-reported and unverified — a report does not prove a device caused harm or that a manufacturer is at fault, and report volume is influenced by how widely a device is used.

Data freshness and accuracy

CMS refreshes Hospital Compare data periodically and FDA adds device reports on a rolling basis, so the figures on a page reflect the most recent official export we have loaded. Some hospitals lack an overall rating because they did not report enough measures, and the absence of a measure does not mean a hospital performs well or poorly on it. We work to keep the data accurate and aligned with the source, but we cannot guarantee it is complete, current, or free of upstream limitations. If you spot a figure that looks wrong, please report it through our corrections process.

Before you choose a hospital

Treat PlainHospital as one input among several. Before you act on what you read here, we recommend you also:

• Check the hospital directly on the official Medicare Care Compare tool, which is authoritative for current CMS measures.
• Talk to your physician about which hospital is right for your specific condition or procedure.
• Confirm the hospital is in your insurance network and accepts your coverage.
• Look at the measures most relevant to your care — a strong overall rating does not guarantee strong performance on the specific procedure you need.

No affiliation

PlainHospital is an independent publisher. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by CMS, the FDA, the Department of Veterans Affairs, or any hospital or health system. Outbound links to official sources are provided for verification and do not imply any partnership.

Questions

Questions about how to use this data, or about a specific figure, are welcome at hello@plainhospital.com. See also our editorial & corrections policy and methodology.