St. Vincent specialty draws 48th ranking

7/19/2003

Ending a two-year absence, a northwest Ohio hospital is back on U.S. News & World Report's annual list that ranks the country's top medical specialty programs.

St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center was ranked 48th out of the country's top 50 hormonal disorder programs.

“We are very pleased that we are recognized nationally for the quality of care provided by our physicians and employees,” said spokesman Megan Manahan.

She said she believed it was the first time St. Vincent made the list, the 14th year the magazine has rated the country's best hospitals.

Hormonal disorders largely involves patients with diabetes.

“We have a large proportion of patients with diabetes,” Ms. Manahan said.

U.S. News ranks medical specialty programs in 17 disciplines. To be considered in all but four of the disciplines, hospitals have to either be a member of the Council of Teaching Hospitals, be affiliated with a medical school, or offer at least nine of the 17 specialties on the list. That criteria eliminated two-thirds of the country's 6,000 hospitals.

Toledo Hospital's was the last area hospital to appear on one of the magazine's lists, when its urology department ranked 41st out of 50 in 2000. Medical College of Ohio Hospitals placed two departments on the list in 1999. Orthopedics was ranked 28th and urology 46th that year. MCO, which also made two of the lists in 1995, has not made the list since 1999.

On U.S. News's list of the country's top 17 overall hospitals, Cleveland Clinic was ranked fifth and the University of Michigan Medical Center in an Ann Arbor was rated ninth.

Elsewhere around the state, Summa Health System in Akron made the list in 11 specialties and University Hospitals of Cleveland made 14 of the lists. Christ Hospital in Cincinnati and the Ohio State University Medical Center in Columbus made several of the lists, while Greater Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton and Mercy Medical Center in Canton made one list each.