Not All Hospitals Are Created Equally.Not By A Long-Shot. This article highlights a very sad story of a poorly run pediatric heart program at a highly prestigious children’s hospital. Many of the problems at this hospital are similar to problems found at other hospitals that have specialized programs, including perhaps the biggest issue: not treating enough patients per year (or case volume) to develop the needed medical expertise to reliably get safe patient outcomes. Reaching adequate case volumes to keep up skills is a challenge because so many hospitals are competing for patients — these programs are an important driver of profits, so hospitals want to keep them going. Some geographic regions (and many countries) have creative ‘regional hubs’ so that an area could only have as many cardiovascular surgical programs as the population could support...Unlike what we see in this country where competing programs might only be a few miles apart. What to do? Look up publicly reported data (Hospital Compare is a good source), ask doctors for their complication rates and ask how they compare to other, top-notch programs... Selected Excerpt: “When you get on an airplane, you want a pilot who does this every day. By having a dedicated (medical) team, you reduce variability.” …see more