This report examines the second year participation and quality measure results for Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs) in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Hospital Compare public reporting database. Although CAHs do not face the same financial incentives as hospitals paid under the Medicare Prospective Payment System (PPS) to participate, the Hospital Compare initiative provides an important opportunity for CAHs to assess and improve their performance on national standards of care. The current study updates the results of a previous study of Year 1 Hospital Compare results for CAHs. There is also a full-length briefing paper that details these same Year 2 results.

Key Findings:

• 53% of CAHs were participating in Hospital Compare (by submitting data on at least one measure for 2005 discharges) as of September 2006.
• Both CAHs and non-CAHs showed significant positive increases in the percent of patients receiving recommended care for the majority of quality measures.
• CAHs still have room improvement, especially with regard to recommended care for acute myocardial infarction (heart attack or AMI) and heart failure patients.
• Low volume remains a problem for calculating a number of measures for CAHs, especially AMI measures, at the individual hospital level.