Best Hospital Ratings in VA: Where to Find it & Mapped for in & Around Virginia
- Adam Garrett
- Jun 4, 2024
- 12 min read
Updated: Feb 24
Above: Image by Adam of Riverside Hospital in Newport News
One of the questions people sometimes wonder about when locating a place to move to is hospitals &/or local medical facilities. Many want to move close to one of the better hospitals or at least a hospital of some kind due to known medical needs or simply because they want to ensure that if there is a medical need, good care isn't far away. I have developed a few maps that should be able to resolve this question for those moving to VA, and I found where those moving anywhere in the US can look to answer the same question, though it's not typically mapped out elsewhere like I've done, making it significantly more cumbersome to work with in the absence of a map. In case you're wondering, Google Maps, Yelp, & Facebook are not where you'll be headed first, second, or even 3rd for this question.
The Maps:
States I've Covered in Maps 1 & 2
The states (+DC) I've covered for the top ratings platform I found (Newsweek) including VA, states adjacent to VA, and some beyond, are (in alphabetical order by abbreviation):
CT, DC, GA, KY, MA, MD, NC, NH, NJ, NY, PA, RI, SC, TN, VA, WV
One of the reasons I didn't include Ohio is due to the limited flight accessibility to Ohio, where for those outside of Northern VA, the only options to fly to Ohio are seasonal.
Map 1: 9 Layers of Newsweek + 1 Layer of Top Medicare Rankings
The below map is my favorite of the 3 maps I've created, highlighting what I believe to be the best hospitals in & around VA in 2024 based on my research, combining 2 models to produce the below map. The Newsweek #s appear to be more reliable, but the Medicare rankings fill in some of the gaps for a higher volume of total hospitals availalable to choose from.
The layers are in chronological order, with the following color categories in order:
Gold: 1-20 ranked on Newsweek
Silver: 21-50 ranked on Newsweek
Bronze: 51-100 ranked on Newsweek
Blue: 101-150 ranked on Newsweek
Red: 151-200 ranked on Newsweek
Yellow: 201-250 ranked on Newsweek
Magenta: 251-300 ranked on Newsweek
Purple: 301-350 ranked on Newsweek
Mustard Green: 351+ ranked on Newsweek
Charcoal: 5 star 4+ Patient Rated Hospitals per Medicare.gov (covering less states)
Ensure that all hospitals are checked or isolate to the top rankings on the top left.
That said, I suggest not relying exclusively on the above map, but comparing the different maps I have here.
Medicare.gov Website Rankings Map 2
With this map I've used the Medicare.gov website to compare providers and ordered them based on their rankings with a smaller pattern around VA than the prior map. Ensure that all hospitals are checked or isolate to the top rankings on the top left.:
The layers are in chronological order, with the following color categories in order:
Gold: 5 Star Overall Rating w/ 4-5 Patient Survey Rating
Silver: 5 Star Overall Rating w/ 3 Patient Survey Rating
Bronze: 4 Star Overall Rating w/ 4-5 Patient Survey Rating
Blue: 4 Star Overall Rating w/ 3 Patient Survey Rating
Red: 4 Star Overall Rating w/ 2 Patient Survey Rating
Map 3: 9 Layers of Newsweek Across Mid Atlantic + 1 Layer of Unranked Hospitals Primarily in VA
For those looking for the vast majority of VA hospitals, but wanting the best rankings involved as well, I've produced this map:
Ensure that all hospitals are checked or isolate to the top rankings on the top left.
The layers are in chronological order, with the following color categories in order:
Gold: 1-20 ranked on Newsweek
Silver: 21-50 ranked on Newsweek
Bronze: 51-100 ranked on Newsweek
Blue: 101-150 ranked on Newsweek
Red: 151-200 ranked on Newsweek
Yellow: 201-250 ranked on Newsweek
Magenta: 251-300 ranked on Newsweek
Purple: 301-350 ranked on Newsweek
Mustard Green: 351+ ranked on Newsweek
Charcoal: Unranked Hospitals Not Mentioned in Newsweek Rankings (tightest pattern considered)
Map 4: Military Installations w/ Primary Veteran's Affairs Hospitals
Ensure that all facilities are checked or isolate to the top rankings on the top left.
When Hospital Rankings & Proximity Hit Home:
When Hospital Proximity Hit Home for Me: They Died on the Long Way to the Hospital in the Ambulance
The importance of hospital proximity question hit home for me recently at a homeowners association meeting I attended where many in the HOA came into the meeting upset about a hospital being planned to be built next door to our HOA. I saw the move as an asset to our community, especially after leaving that meeting. One of the people in our HOA shared about how her relative in a neighboring county died in the ambulance on the way to a hospital, with no hospital near the relative, with them needing to travel around 40 miles and around 50 minutes to get from that county to the hospital where they were going, and that's if there was no traffic and no bridge opening to cross the James River Bridge. With this new hospital, the time it would take for them to have gotten to a hospital would be cut down to around 25 miles and around 35 minutes, which isn't ideal, but much more reasonable, and not with the threat of a bridge lift.
When Hospital Ratings Hit Home for Me Recently: I Feared for my Newborn Son's Life Due to Inconsistent Quality of Care & Staff Negligence/Unprofessional Volatility Putting my Son & Wife in Harm's Way Needlessly
The hospital ratings question hit home for me recently when my wife gave birth. I'll leave the facility nameless here but my clients are welcome to ask me for the name of the facility. While most of the staff were fine at the location, and some were great, there were a few bad apples that spoiled our experience to the degree that we couldn't wait to leave, fearing for the safety of our newborn baby as long as we were there, & hoping to never return to the facility. Four examples from that 1 experience include:
One of our nurses wrapped our baby too tightly in the swaddle within 24 hrs of birth. We asked if it was too tight, and she said it wasn't. He had labored breathing. After she left, we loosened the swaddle, and the labored breathing stopped immediately. If we had let it be, we don't know if our baby would have survived.
One of our nurses that we had within 24 hrs of his birth should not have been an infant ward nurse in my opinion. She had long fingernails that notably hurt my wife while she performed her work, where her care for cosmetics clearly outweighed her care for her patients to allow something like that to happen. She made our baby cry much more than any other nurse while changing him, not being gentle compared to other nurses or compared to us as parents when changing him, and inflicting pain in obvious ways while changing him and not being thorough with cleaning him. The last straw was when she was performing the hearing test in a soundproof room. She stated a certain amount of time that she would take. I went with a nurse to check on him and get an updated estimated time of completion of her work. She responded by yelling at the other nurse so loudly only a few feet from my baby (stating that she told me the time it would take originally) that I could hear through the soundproof walls more than 30 feet away from her. I don't recall ever hearing anything else in that room while the door was closed due to soundproofing. Soon after I requested that the nurse no longer care for him, but one of the nurses attempted to come to her defense and tried to deny what I saw and that the other nurse was witness to. After this incident, which occurred the same night as the swaddle incident, I didn't feel comfortable going to sleep, instead wanting to hold the baby through the night awake, not knowing if it would be my last night with him and wanting to keep a closer eye on the staff and his care.
Our lactation consultant spoke notably much more loudly than any staff member we spoke with, and got angry at us when I asked if she could speak more softly. It was only her, the baby, and my wife & I in the room. She kept at it even after I quickly looked up the decibel levels that you shouldn't exceed with a newborn (65 decibels), let her know, and when I showed her the decibels that she was speaking within earshot of the baby, where the typical levels within earshot of the baby were in the 70's typically, with some in the 80's, while the baby was trying to sleep. For reference, in the realm of real estate, military air noise levels also start at 65 decibels. The nurse angrily asked if we wanted her to whisper, and if we wanted someone else, but my wife didn't want to cause too much of a scene. Other staff members who we asked to whisper were never angry & obliged without hesitation. Not knowing what else to do when she refused to acquiesce to a request to quiet down (that no other staff member had a problem with when asked) all I could do was to "shhh" the baby's proximity throughout the time she spoke to my wife to create a measure of white noise while continuing to hold the decibel reader to show the nurse what she was doing that she was seemingly completely apathetic about.
One procedure was done, but gauze was accidentally left inside my wife that wasn't supposed to be. They thankfully were able to find out about the error hours later, and performed a 2nd procedure to pull the gauze out. If they hadn't caught it, very bad things could have happened.
Primary Rating Platform I Used with Map 1
The primary source of hospitals for the 1st map was Newsweek's National Rankings:
Newsweek also published Global Rankings in case you're interested in taking a peek, including in or close to VA Johns Hopkins at #4, Duke University at #68, & University of Virginia Medical Center at 236:
These are also viewable on Statista.
Secondary Rating Platform I Used in Map 1 & Primary Rating Platform Used in Map 2
I also used a rating system developed by Medicare of an overall hospital quality star rating as well as user ratings with the same system.
Here is some helpful information on it:
That same page went into further detail regarding the measures that were used, none of which involved whether or not Medicare was an option for aid. Notably, "Overall Star Ratings aren’t calculated for Department of Defense (DoD) hospitals."
What about Google Maps?
While there are many businesses where Google Maps, Yelp, and Facebook are helpful, hospitals do not appear to be something where the score itself is very reliable. The algorithms used in the ratings I chose appear to be far more reliable than the Google Maps ratings in this case. For instance, look at the ratings of Johns Hopkins per Google Maps, which is in stark contrast to the #3 national ranking I went off for the Newsweek rankings, in contrast to US News & World Report's Top US hospitals, & in contrast to it ranking in the Medicare rankings I included on the map:
Veterans Affairs Hospitals & Other Facilities: Medical Centers in Hampton & Salem in VA & Other Facilities Elsewhere in VA
While there are a number of other facilities elsewhere, for those looking for a true VA hospital, Richmond & Salem is where to go.
Per VA:
Veterans Health Administration |
| ||
VA Health Care System | |||
Richmond: | |||
VA Medical Center | |||
Hampton: | |||
Salem: | |||
Outpatient Clinic | |||
Bristol: | |||
Winchester: | |||
Community Based Outpatient Clinic | |||
Charlottesville: | |||
Chesapeake: | |||
Danville: | |||
Fort Belvoir: | |||
Fredericksburg: | |||
Fredericksburg: | |||
Harrisonburg: | |||
Jonesville: | |||
Lynchburg: | |||
Marion: | |||
Norton: | |||
Staunton: | |||
Tazewell: | |||
Vansant: | |||
Virginia Beach: | |||
Wytheville: | |||
Vet Center | |||
Alexandria: | |||
Chesapeake: | |||
Leesburg: | |||
Richmond: | |||
Roanoke: | |||
Virginia Beach: |
Veterans Affairs Medical Centers in VA & Nearby States:
534 | 109 Bee Street Charleston, SC 29401-5799 | SC | 843-577-5011 Or 843-577-5011 | |
637 | 1100 Tunnel Road Asheville, NC 28805 | NC | 828-298-7911 | |
558 | 508 Fulton Street Durham, NC 27705 | NC | 919-286-0411 Or 919-286-0411 | |
565 | 2300 Ramsey Street Fayetteville, NC 28301 | NC | 910-488-2120 Or 910-488-2120 | |
590 | 100 Emancipation Drive Hampton, VA 23667 | VA | 757-722-9961 | |
658 | 1970 Roanoke Boulevard Salem, VA 24153 | VA | 540-982-2463 Or 540-982-2463 | |
659 | 1601 Brenner Avenue Salisbury, NC 28144 | NC | 704-638-9000 Or 704-638-9000 | |
512 | 10 North Greene Street Baltimore, MD 21201 | MD | 410-605-7000 Or 410-605-7000 | |
621 | Corner of Dogwood Avenue and Second Street Mountain Home, TN 37684 Mailing Address: P.O. Box 4000 Mountain Home, TN 37684 | TN | 423-926-1171 | |
596A4 | 1101 Veterans Drive Lexington, KY 40502-2236 | KY | 859-281-4900 Or 859-233-4511 | |
596 | 2250 Leestown Rd Lexington, KY 40511-1052 | KY | 859-233-4511 Or 859-281-4900 | |
614 | 116 N Pauline St Memphis, TN 38105 | TN | 901-523-8990 Or 901-523-8990 | |
603 | 800 Zorn Avenue Louisville, KY 40206 | KY | 502-287-4000 Or 502-287-4000 | |
626A4 | 3400 Lebanon Pike Murfreesboro, TN 37129 | TN | 615-867-6000 Or 615-867-6000 | |
626 | 1310 24th Avenue South Nashville, TN 37212-2637 | TN | 615-327-4751 | |
517 | 200 Veterans Avenue Beckley, WV 25801 | WV | 304-255-2121 Or 304-255-2121 | |
540 | One Medical Center Drive Clarksburg, WV 26301 | WV | 304-623-3461 Or 800-733-0512 | |
581 | 1540 Spring Valley Drive Huntington, WV 25704 | WV | 304-429-6741 | |
512GB | 3900 Loch Raven Boulevard Baltimore, MD 21218 | MD | 410-605-7000 Or 410-605-7000 | |
613 | 510 Butler Avenue Martinsburg, WV 25405 | WV | 304-263-0811 Or 800-817-3807 | |
512A5 | VA Medical Center Perry Point, MD 21902 | MD | 410-642-2411 Or 410-642-2411 | |
688 | 50 Irving Street, NW Washington, DC 20422-0001 | DC | 202-745-8000 |
Where to Find Ratings in Other Areas & w/ Specific Use Cases in Mind:
Best Hospitals by Specialty
Newsweek also has coverage of rankings of the following specialties in a separate rankings article that can be sorted by country & specialty:
Cardiac Surgery
Cardiology
Endocrinology
Gastroenterology
Neurology
Neurosurgery
Obstetrics & Gynecology
Oncology
Orthopedics
Pediatrics
Pulmonology
Urology
Related:
About the Author: Adam Garrett - 3rd Generation REALTOR®
Adam is the 3rd generation in a line of award-winning real estate agents serving SE VA. He has served full time at Garrett Realty Partners since May 2014 when he joined the marketing department before transitioning to full-time sales to assist buyers and sellers in February 2015. He believes that an educated buyer or seller makes the best decisions, & is dedicated to helping with that both digitally & on-site physically for buyers & sellers. He's also available for referrals to real estate agents around the globe. In several capacities, his resources & direct offerings for assisting sellers & assisting buyers are either unmatched or are top 1% for the SE VA area, and in some cases, nationwide. Not stopping after closing, he also provides information for tenants, landlords, & homeowners.
Related for Buyers:
Related for Sellers:
While Adam can refer buyers and sellers elsewhere, Adam’s direct coverage includes most of SE VA including Hampton Roads (VA Peninsula, Southside, & Middle Peninsula), the Northern Neck, & Greater Richmond.
Adam's Coverage Map with Adam's 5 Multiple Listing Services highlighted in orange & areas without good MLS coverage excluded:
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