Lurie Children’s Hospital is the No. 1 children’s hospital in Illinois and tied for third best in the Midwest this year, according to new rankings from U.S. News & World Report.
U.S. News named UChicago Medicine Comer Children’s Hospital as the second best children’s hospital in Illinois, and Advocate Children’s Hospital as the third. Last year, Comer and Advocate tied for second.
This year, Comer was named 17th best in the Midwest, and Advocate tied for 22nd best in the Midwest.
No Illinois hospital has scored a spot on U.S. News’ list of the top 10 children’s hospitals in the country since 2018, when Lurie last earned that distinction.
“We’re obviously very proud to be ranked No. 1,” said Dr. Marcelo Malakooti, chief medical officer at Lurie. “I think the rankings are an important tool and guide for families when they might have a complex child and they’re trying to figure out what works best for their families and the specific conditions they might have.”
He said he’s confident Lurie will be back in the top 10 nationwide “in the near future.” While it’s important to Lurie to focus on clinical outcomes, the hospital also prioritizes “holistic comprehensive care that really extends beyond the areas that are being ranked,” he said, which includes family support, community outreach and cutting edge treatments.
To come up with the rankings, U.S. News and RTI International, a research and consulting firm, collected and analyzed data from 108 children’s hospitals across the nation and surveyed thousands of pediatric specialists. The rankings are based on outcomes (such as survival, infections and complications), commitment to patient safety, clinical resources, family centeredness and expert opinions, among other factors.
U.S. News evaluated the children’s hospitals across 11 specialties. Lurie ranked among the top 50 children’s hospitals nationwide in all 11 specialties, and was among the top 25 in at least nine of them. Lurie’s highest specialty rankings were in neurology and neurosurgery, in which it placed seventh in the country, and neonatology in which it placed 10th.
Comer ranked among the top 50 children’s hospitals nationwide in four specialities (behavioral health, cancer, neurology/neurosurgery and urology), and Advocate in one specialty (cardiology and heart surgery).
Comer’s ranking “represents the outstanding care we provide,” said Dr. John Cunningham, physician-in-chief of Comer and chair of the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Chicago. Among other offerings, he touted a surgery the hospital performs on children whose epilepsy isn’t well controlled with medication, and its ability to offer gene therapy for children with sickle cell disease.
Still, both he and Malakooti cautioned that patients should use the rankings as just one piece of information when choosing a hospital.
“Health care, especially in pediatrics, is far more nuanced than what can be captured in rankings alone,” Malakooti said. “It’s one piece of the puzzle. … To me, what matters the most is the quality of care the child is receiving.”
Experts advise consumers to look at multiple ratings, their health insurance coverage and to consider their doctors’ recommendations when choosing a hospital in a non-emergency situation.
A number of organizations rank and rate hospitals each year, often using different methodologies and reaching different conclusions. Newsweek recently ranked Lurie as the ninth best specialized hospital in the world for pediatrics.
High performing hospitals often pay close attention to the rankings and ratings, using them in their advertising in hopes of attracting more patients, including in the competitive Chicago-area health care market.
U.S. News ranked Cincinnati Children’s Hospital and Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Ohio as tied for the best children’s hospitals in the Midwest and said the two were among its top 10 nationwide. Other top 10 hospitals nationwide this year, in alphabetical order, include Boston Children’s Hospital; Children’s Hospital Colorado; Children’s Hospital Los Angeles; Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia; Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C.; Rady Children’s Hospital-San Diego; Seattle Children’s Hospital; and Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston.
