Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1468749
45 QUALITY IMPROVEMENT & MEASUREMENT Health systems that gave the most, least charity care compared to their tax exemptions: Lown Institute By Kelly Gooch H ealth systems across the U.S. made Lown Institute's new rankings lists for organizations where charity care and community investment spending was less or more than the value of their tax exemption. e rankings, released April 12 by the nonpartisan healthcare think tank, examine meaningful community benefit spending for nonprofit hospital systems nationwide. For the rankings, researchers calculated fair share spending for more than 1,800 hospitals across 275 nonprofit hospital systems based on hospital tax filings from fiscal year ending 2018 or 2019, whichever was the most recent year available. Each system's spending on charity care and community investment was compared to the value of its tax exemption. Systems were considered to have a fair share deficit if their spending on charity care and community in- vestment was less than the value of their tax exemption. ey were considered to have a fair share surplus if their spending on charity care and community investment exceeded the value of their tax exemption. More infor- mation about the rankings is available here. e 10 private nonprofit hospital systems with the largest fair share deficits, as ranked by the Lown Institute: 1. Providence St. Joseph Health, now known as Providence (Renton, Wash.): $705 million 2. Trinity Health (Livonia, Mich.): $671 million 3. Mass General Brigham (Boston): $625 million 4. Cleveland Clinic: $611 million 5. UPMC (Pittsburgh): $601 million 6. University of Pennsylvania Health System (Philadelphia): $571 million 7. Catholic Health Initiatives (Englewood, Colo.), now part of Chicago-based Com- monSpirit Health: $515 million 8. Advocate Aurora Health (Milwaukee and Downers Grove, Ill.): $498 million 9. Dignity Health (San Francisco), now part of CommonSpirit: $456 million 10. Ascension Health (St. Louis): $388 million e 10 private nonprofit hospital systems with the largest fair share surpluses, as ranked by the Lown Institute: 1. Memorial Hermann Health System (Houston): $147 million 2. Wellstar Health System (Marietta, Ga.): $144 million 3. Nebraska Medical Center (Omaha): $108 million 4. Christus Health (Irving, Texas): $93 million 5. Houston Methodist: $80 million 6. Hackensack Meridian Health (Edison, N.J.): $74 million 7. Baptist Memorial Health Care (Memphis, Tenn.): $64 million 8. UCHealth (Aurora, Colo.): $62 million 9. Yale New Haven (Conn.) Health System: $56 million 10. Methodist Health System (Dallas): $53 million n Vanderbilt developing cloud-based tool to track health equity programs By Naomi Diaz N ashville, Tenn.-based Vanderbilt University Medical Center announced plans to develop a cloud- based tool to track community-based activities that help address health inequities. Vanderbilt University Medical Center partnered with the Association of American Medical Colleges on a two-year pilot program to develop an improved, cloud-based ver- sion of a spreadsheet-based tool to track and coordinate health equity efforts at their institutions, according to an April 21 press release. The tool will allow organizations to share data and pro- vide reports to identify populations and geographic areas affected by inequities. The medical center will work with statewide advocacy groups, public health departments and community-based organizations to develop the tool over the first six months of the pilot. They will then have a year to use the tool to track and guide its efforts, make improvements and prepare the tool for broader use for organizations working toward health equity. At the end of the pilot, the tool will be evaluated and ap- propriate changes will be made, if necessary, with the aim for it to be available in 2024. n