Amount, cost of medical care varies widely

HANOVER, N.H., May 16 (UPI) -- U.S. academic medical centers vary greatly in the amount and cost of care they provide to their sickest patients, the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care says.

The newest edition of the Dartmouth Medical School-produced report says the New York University Medical Center is No. 1 in U.S. hospitalization days for people in the last six months of life.

The New York systems' 32.1 days compare with 12.9 days at Mayo Clinic's principal hospital, St. Mary's, and 3.3 days at the University of California's San Francisco Medical Center.

There are "huge differences in practice patterns across hospitals in the U.S. and even across academic medical centers," Dartmouth's Elliott Fisher told The Wall Street Journal.

The latest healthcare atlas is the first to spotlight care differences among the nation's most prestigious medical institutions and the first to gauge performance of 4,300 individual hospitals.

It was compiled from Medicare patient data for at least 12 major illnesses.