In what may be an ongoing tussle for bragging rights between Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and its neighbor to the west, the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Cedars has pulled ahead.
U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals list came out last week, and Cedars was ranked No. 1 in California, while the UCLA Med Center came out No. 2. That’s a reversal from last year, when UCLA was ranked the best in the state – a position it has held for several years – and Cedars was No. 2.
Both hospitals rank highly on the national list. Cedars was ranked No. 2 nationally and the UCLA Med Center was No. 5, tied with Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. The No. 1 slot nationally went to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, for the seventh year in a row.
Cedars was nationally ranked by U.S. News in 11 specialty areas, including cardiology and heart surgery; ear, nose and throat; gastroenterology and GI surgery; geriatrics; neurology and neurosurgery, and orthopedics.
UCLA Med Center was nationally ranked in 14 adult specialties and seven children’s specialties.
Among its nationally ranked specialties were cancer; diabetes and endocrinology; ear, nose and throat; geriatrics; obstetrics and gynecology; ophthalmology; psychiatry, and orthopedics.
The only other California hospital in the magazine’s top 20 was Stanford Health Care-Stanford Hospital, which placed 10th.
Ranking further down the list were these L.A.-area hospitals: Keck Medical Center of USC, Torrance Memorial Medical Center, MemorialCare Long Beach Medical Center, Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills, Providence St. John’s Health Center in Santa Monica and Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center.
