For the heart failure 30-day re-admission rate measurement, CMS tracks the percentage of Medicare patients who need to go back into a hospital within 30 days. If a hospital's re-admission rates are higher than average, it could mean that patients are being sent home too early or do not fully understand how to care for themselves after leaving the hospital.

To evaluate hospitals' performance, CMS gathers the re-admission rates of all hospitals and uses them to calculate an average re-admission rate. To allow for statistical variation, the range of re-admission rates considered average includes rates that may be higher or lower than the exact average rate.

Finally, CMS compares individual hospitals' re-admission rates against the average re-admission rate. If a hospital falls into the average range, it is considered "no different than the U.S. national rate." If a hospital's re-admission rate is higher than the average range, it is considered "worse than the U.S. national rate." If a hospital's re-admission rate is lower than the average range, it is considered "better than the U.S. national rate."

More heart failure measurements

• Patients given discharge instructions
• Patients given an evaluation of left ventricular systolic function
• Patients given ACE inhibitor or ARB for left ventricular systolic dysfunction
• Patients given smoking-cessation advice or couseling
• Heart failure mortality rates
• Heart failure re-admission rates

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