WATCH: America’s Most Socially Responsible Hospitals, 2024

This week, the Lown Institute unveiled 2024’s Most Socially Responsible Hospitals as part of this year’s Lown Institute Hospitals Index. Panelists Dr. Nabil Chehade (Executive Vice President, Chief Population & Digital Health Officer, MetroHealth), Dr. Rajika Reed (Vice President of Community Health, St. Luke’s University Health Network), and Dr. Paul Hattis (Senior Fellow, Lown Institute) joined Lown Institute President Dr. Vikas Saini to reflect on the top performers and how they earned their ranks.

The Lown Institute Hospitals Index is the first ranking to include metrics for health equity and value of care alongside patient outcomes. We were honored to welcome leaders from some of our top performing hospitals and systems to share with us how they excel in these categories.

For Dr. Reed and St. Luke’s University Health Network, it comes down to a comprehensive and inclusive community health needs assessment (CHNA). The system conducts all of their CHNAs in-house (rather than outsourcing the work) and get feedback from community members through interviews, forums, and a survey. During their most-recent CHNA, they received 11,523 responses.

“The [community health needs] assessment process is really an exercise in partner development. It takes a lot of trust from our partners to be able to speak honestly on what the needs are… We all play well in the sandbox together because we built that trust within the community.”

– Dr. Rajika Reed, Vice President of Community Health, St. Luke’s University Health Network

At MetroHealth, Dr. Chehade spoke to the system’s journey to embracing value-based care.

“When I joined eight years ago, less than 5% of our care was value-based… Today, more than 90% of our patients are in some form of value-based care.”

– Dr. Nabil Chehade, Executive Vice President, Chief Population & Digital Health Officer, MetroHealth

Panelists also explored trends in the performance of for-profit hospitals and private equity-backed systems on the Index. For-profit hospitals tended to have poorer performance on social responsibility, and private equity systems fell short on outcomes and value metrics in particular. 

“There’s been a lot of extracting of resources and negotiated high rental payments facing [private equity-owned] institutions, which is forcing them into bankruptcy.”

– Dr. Paul Hattis, Senior Fellow, Lown Institute

See all of the top performing hospitals on our website.