Best Hospitals For Maternity Care: 48 CA Hospitals Make U.S. News List

CALIFORNIA— Where their baby is born is one of the most important decisions parents make. In California, 48 hospitals were ranked among the Best Hospitals for Maternity Care for 2022-23 released Tuesday by U.S. News & World Report.

In the ranking of nearly 650 hospitals providing labor and delivery services, fewer than half received the “high performing” designation, the highest a hospital can receive for maternity care.

Of the 67 hospitals that participated in the maternity services survey, the following 48 received the “high performing” designation:

• UCSF Health-UCSF Medical Center

• Corona Regional Medical Center

• Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Medical Center

• Sutter Medical Center

• Kaiser Permanente Anaheim and Irvine Medical Centers

• Bakersfield Memorial Hospital

• St. Mary Medical Center-Apple Valley

• Enloe Medical Center

• Kaiser Permanente Baldwin Park Medical Center

• MemorialCare Miller Children's and Women's Hospital Long Beach

• Stanford Health Care-ValleyCare

• Loma Linda University Children's Hospital

• Kaiser Permanente Downey Medical Center

• MemorialCare Saddleback Medical Center

• Providence St. Joseph Medical Center-Burbank

• NorthBay Medical Center

• Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center

• Cedars-Sinai Medical Center

• Scripps Memorial Hospital-Encinitas

• Palomar Medical Center Escondido

• Kaiser Permanente Fontana and Ontario Medical Centers

• MemorialCare Orange Coast Medical Center

• Providence St. Jude Medical Center

• Adventist Health Glendale

• Sharp Grossmont Hospital

• Palomar Medical Center Poway

• Kaiser Permanente West Los Angeles Medical Center

• El Camino Health-Mountain View

• Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian

• UCI Medical Center

• Providence St. Joseph Hospital-Orange

• Huntington Hospital

• Redlands Community Hospital

• Kaiser Permanente Riverside Medical Center

• Methodist Hospital of Sacramento

• Salinas Valley Memorial Healthcare System

• Arrowhead Regional Medical Center

• Scripps Mercy Hospital

• UC San Diego Health-La Jolla and Hillcrest Hospitals

• Santa Clara Valley Medical Center

• Providence Saint John's Health Center

• UCLA Santa Monica Medical Center

• Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Stanford

• Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center

• Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center Torrance

• Kaiser Permanente Panorama City Medical Center

• Kaweah Health Medical Center

Kaiser Permanente Woodland Hills Medical Center

Each hospital participating in the survey received a scorecard describing their performance on a checklist of items parents look for when choosing where to have their baby.

The remaining California hospitals that completed the U.S. News survey but did not rank as “high performing” included:

• Kaiser Permanente Moreno Valley Medical Center

• Sharp Mary Birch Hospital for Women and Newborns

• Loma Linda University Medical Center-Murrieta

• Emanate Health Queen of The Valley Hospital

• Saint Agnes Medical Center

• USC Verdugo Hills Hospital

• Kaiser Permanente South Bay Medical Center

• Scripps La Jolla Hospitals

• Kaiser Permanente San Diego Zion and San Diego Medical Center

• UCLA Medical Center

• Providence Mission Hospital-Mission Viejo and Laguna Beach

• Tri-City Medical Center

• Desert Regional Medical Center

• Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center

• UC Davis Medical Center

• Natividad Medical Center

• Providence Holy Cross Medical Center

• Torrance Memorial Medical Center

• John Muir Health-Walnut Creek Medical Center

Hospitals not listed did not participate in the survey.

U.S. News said relatively little information is readily available to the public about which hospitals are best at caring for expectant parents after an uncomplicated pregnancy.

The ranking differs from other hospital rankings in an important way: The patients at maternity hospitals are younger, so the data used in the rankings was collected individually from the hospitals rather than through required Medicare reports.

The rankings are based on C-section rates in lower-risk pregnancies, newborn complication rates, exclusive breast milk feeding rates and early elective delivery rates, among other factors.

This year for the first time as part of its methodology, U.S. News considered rates of episiotomy procedures (a small cut made at the vaginal opening to assist in difficult deliveries), rates of vaginal births of subsequent children after a Cesarean delivery, and whether hospitals met new federal criteria for “birthing-friendly” practices — a publicly reported, public-facing designation by the Department of Health and Human Services to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity.

Also new this year, hospitals that tracked and reported their outcomes for patients of different races and ethnicities were rewarded in the rankings.

“Identifying racial disparities in maternity care is a vital step toward achieving health equity,” Min Hee Seo, senior health data scientist at U.S. News, said in a news release.

“The new measures provide expectant parents with many important data points, such as whether hospitals implemented patient safety practices, to assist them in making a decision about where to receive maternity care,” Seo said.