This cover story involved a three-month original investigation that compared actual average costs (not charges) and outcomes for a single common cardiovascular procedure at two competing hospitals in a dozen randomly chosen markets. What Carlson found was that in 7 of 12 cities, the hospital with the lower average costs also had lower readmission rates, which is a good measure of hospital quality. Through anecdotes and original data analysis, the story was able to show that the growing use of data on costs and outcomes will “put pressure on hospital to become more cost-efficient and improve their outcomes” or “payers and patients may take their business elsewhere.”
