The Ontario government is considering a ranking system that would award Ontario hospitals stars for good performance, while identifying poor performers, the Ottawa Citizen claims . The “name-and-shame” scheme would be modeled after a short-lived British experiment. 'Under the proposed system, hospitals would be given a rating of as many as three stars for their performance in areas such as treating patients safely and effectively, reducing surgical and emergency-room waits and improving cleanliness. Another system under consideration would simply rate hospitals “excellent,” “good,” “fair” or “weak,” according to documents released to the Citizen under provincial freedom-of-information laws. 'The merits and pitfalls of a star-rating system were discussed in 2009 by a panel of 13 experts advising Health Minister Deb Matthews on the future financing and accountability of hospitals. However, it’s not clear if the government has adopted the idea.' The Citizen adds
Notes from Leftwords -- Doug Allan