Great hospitals bring excellence to every encounter, for every patient, in every specialty, at every level of care, wielding an uncompromising commitment to safety and a culture of nonstop growth.
Becker’s is proud to release its “Great Hospitals in America” list for 2026, celebrating the institutions that have both distinguished reputation and results.
We take into account recognitions from institutions like U.S. News & World Report, Newsweek, Healthgrades, CMS and The Leapfrog Group, who have also honored these hospitals for outstanding performance across a broad spectrum of specialties.
Note: This list is not exhaustive, nor is it an endorsement of included hospitals, health systems or associated healthcare providers. Becker’s accepted nominations and completed editorial research to compile this list. Organizations cannot pay for inclusion on this list. Hospitals are presented in alphabetical order. We extend a very special thank you to Rhoda Weiss for her contributions to this list.
Contact Anna Falvey at afalvey@beckershealthcare.com with questions or comments.
Abbott Northwestern Hospital (Minneapolis). Allina Health’s Abbott Northwestern Hospital, the largest private hospital in the Twin Cities, has served its neighborhood since 1882 and now cares for more than 200,000 patients annually. U.S. News & World Report has ranked it the top hospital in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area for 12 consecutive years, and the hospital holds four-time Magnet designation for nursing excellence. Abbott Northwestern’s Allina Health Brain and Spine Institute, launched in April 2023, became the first and only health system in the Twin Cities to offer incision-free focused ultrasound treatment for essential tremor and has adopted RAPID.AI neuroimaging to speed stroke diagnosis and treatment. The Allina Health Cancer Institute became the first program in the Twin Cities to offer histotripsy for liver tumors and the first in Minnesota to offer mobile CT lung cancer screening, and its AI-assisted image review conducted secondary reads on more than 220,000 patient scans in the first half of 2025 alone. The Allina Health Minneapolis Heart Institute’s Cardiovascular Care and Coordination Center has logged more than 8,000 curbside calls in its first 16 months, driving a 35% increase in direct admissions, a 49% reduction in time to accept those admissions, and a 27% increase in cardiovascular procedures. Abbott Northwestern recently completed construction of the Richard M. Schulze Surgical and Critical Care Center, a 10-floor, 620,000-square-foot facility opening in late August 2026 with 190 single-occupancy patient rooms and 30 operating rooms, making it the largest construction project in Allina Health’s history. The new building is Allina Health’s first LEED-certified facility, featuring a 27,000-square-foot rooftop healing garden as part of the hospital’s broader campus revitalization.
AdventHealth Orlando (Fla.). Among the nation’s largest hospitals with 1,400 beds and a sprawling campus of nearly 175 acres with adult and pediatric hospitals, health sciences, advanced education and groundbreaking research, AdventHealth Orlando is U.S. News & World Report’s top ranked hospital in central Florida and among the top two in the state. It cares for more cardiovascular patients and diagnoses more patients with cancer than any hospital in Florida. The flagship facility of AdventHealth, a premiere national health system with over 50 hospital campuses in nine states, AdventHealth Orlando is Central Florida’s only solid-organ transplant program, and region’s only lung transplant program. Nicholson Center trains surgeons from around the globe on the latest robotic technology and techniques. AdventHealth Research Institute’s extensive clinical trial portfolio is led by over 1,000 investigators and staff, contributing to advances like diabetes treatment, neurodegenerative disease, understanding immunotherapies and CAR T treatment. Its 319 cancer-related studies include 283 interventional trials and 55 phase 1 studies, giving more patients access to latest options. Over 100,000 patients annually choose AdventHealth Orthopedic Institute at AdventHealth Orlando and its specialists for care, with over 25,000 surgical procedures each year. It is Florida’s first hospital to launch an innovative AI and genetics programs to help patients learn the risk for and better detect breast cancer. Investments in access include a new patient and surgical tower, and a cancer institute. Health professionals and executives worldwide aim to adopt the hospital’s dedication to whole person care, unique culture and healing environment.
Atlantic Health Morristown (N.J.) Medical Center. Atlantic Health Morristown Medical Center, flagship facility of Atlantic Health System, has served the community for more than 130 years with advanced emergency, heart, cancer, orthopedic, pediatric and specialty care. U.S. News & World Report ranks the hospital’s cardiology and heart surgery program among the top 50 in the nation and its orthopedics program among the top 30. The medical center was also named to Newsweek‘s World’s Best Hospitals list for 2026. Atlantic Health System has proposed a $1 billion expansion of the Morristown campus that would add roughly 700,000 square feet of new facilities. The project is intended to expand capacity, accommodate more patients and support increasingly sophisticated care as the hospital’s needs evolve. Other recent news for the system includes a 2026 partnership with health technology company Garner Health, with the goal of giving employers and their workers a data-driven tool for finding high-quality physicians at lower out-of-pocket cost.
Banner–University Medical Center Phoenix. Nationally recognized for leadership in advanced specialty care, medical education and clinical innovation, Banner–University Medical Center Phoenix is Arizona’s largest hospital. It serves as a premier regional referral center for tertiary and quaternary care across the Southwest, with exceptional distinction in neurosciences, cardiovascular care, oncology, orthopedics, sports medicine and organ transplantation. The hospital provides an immersive training environment for 500 residents and fellows across 50 programs, recently expanding graduate medical education by 250 slots to address critical healthcare workforce needs in urban and rural settings throughout Arizona and beyond. The hospital is home to Arizona’s largest heart transplant program and the world’s busiest total artificial heart program. It also operates Arizona’s busiest birthing center, with 7,000 annual deliveries and is designated as the state’s first level 4 perinatal center. With 36,000 annual admissions, 19,000 surgical procedures and 83,000 emergency department visits, the hospital recently opened a state-of-the-art neurocritical care unit featuring Arizona’s most advanced monitoring technology. Ranked among the top 50 geriatrics programs nationally by U.S. News & World Report, the hospital features a dedicated geriatric emergency department and advanced care for elderly unit. Banner–University Medical Center Phoenix joined the elite 1% of hospitals globally by achieving its fifth Magnet redesignation for nursing excellence in 2025 and ranks in the top three Arizona hospitals by U.S. News & World Report for 2026-27. It is the flagship facility for Banner Health, one of the largest nonprofit health systems in the country.
Banner–University Medical Center Tucson (Ariz.). Ranked the region’s No. 1 hospital for the fourth consecutive year by U.S. News & World Report, Banner–University Medical Center Tucson’s 649-bed academic medical center is the primary teaching hospital for University of Arizona College of Medicine–Tucson. The medical center partners with the University of Arizona’s College of Medicine to lead the Valley Fever Research Center, partners with Banner Alzheimer’s Institute to achieve global breakthroughs, and is one of two Arizona-based National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers. It also houses the state’s specialized Fetal Care Center and has a Joint Commission–accredited spine program. It is Arizona’s largest, most comprehensive “cardioMEMS” heart failure program, one of just two burn centers statewide for adults and children, and Tucson’s only Magnet-certified hospital. Diamond Children’s Medical Center, the state’s only pediatric facility co-located with an adult academic hospital, ensures seamless care transitions into adulthood for children with chronic conditions. The academic mission has significant impact, training 765 residents across 23 accredited residencies and 127 fellows in 44 fellowship programs. 33% of graduates from the past five years practice in Arizona, directly addressing the state’s physician shortage. In 2025, the medical center had 27,035 surgeries, 119,841 emergency visits, 35,813 inpatient admissions, 861,409 outpatient visits and 2,517 births.
Baptist Hospital of Miami. Baptist Hospital of Miami, the flagship hospital of Baptist Health, serves Miami and the surrounding region, drawing patients from across South Florida, the Caribbean and Latin America. The hospital is home to the Baptist Health Herbert Wertheim Cancer Institute, Miami Cardiac & Vascular Institute and Miami Neuroscience Institute, offering advanced care in oncology, heart and vascular, and neuroscience, supported by robotic-assisted surgery and leading-edge diagnostics. Baptist Hospital was the first hospital in Florida to earn Magnet designation for nursing excellence and the only one to receive it six consecutive times, placing it among fewer than 1% of hospitals nationwide. Baptist Health has partnered with Nicklaus Children’s Health System, also based in Miami, so that the hospital’s pediatric emergency physicians are now part of Nicklaus Children’s pediatric specialists, ensuring high-quality emergency care for children in the community. In the U.S. News & World Report 2026-27 “Best Hospitals” rankings, Baptist Hospital of Miami ranked No. 3 in the Miami metro area and No. 7 in Florida. As part of the broader Baptist Health South Florida network, the hospital achieved national recognition and multiple high-performing marks.
Barnes-Jewish Hospital (St. Louis). Barnes-Jewish Hospital, the largest hospital in Missouri and the largest private employer in the St. Louis region, is an affiliated teaching hospital of Washington University School of Medicine, boasting a 1,800-member medical staff. It was the first adult hospital in Missouri certified as a Magnet hospital by the American Nurses Credentialing Center, and U.S. News & World Report ranked it the No. 1 hospital in St. Louis and Missouri in its 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” rankings. Formed by the 1996 merger of Barnes Hospital, which opened in 1914 as one of the first medical teaching centers in the U.S., and The Jewish Hospital of St. Louis, which opened in 1902 to serve the city’s growing immigrant population, Barnes-Jewish is a member of BJC HealthCare, one of the nation’s largest health care organizations. Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital are among the leading recipients of National Institutes of Health research funding, work that has produced a string of clinical firsts, including the world’s first double-lung transplant within a program that has now completed more than 800 lung transplants. Washington University heart surgeons at Barnes-Jewish developed robotic heart surgery, off-pump beating-heart surgery and the Cox Maze procedure for atrial fibrillation, while the hospital’s surgeons also performed the world’s first laparoscopic kidney removal and later developed the mini-nephrectomy procedure for living donors. In 2003, a Washington University surgeon performed the first U.S. surgery to restore voice to a patient using an artificial larynx, and in 2005 Barnes-Jewish surgeons performed the first U.S. surgery to relocate a salivary gland to restore moisture to a tear duct. The hospital’s community outreach includes a refugee health department that assists patients in 33 languages and dialects, the “AWARE” program for domestic violence victims, and more than 165 community education events annually.
Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center (Houston). Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center is a leading academic medical center within the Texas Medical Center in Houston and part of the St. Luke’s Health system. The hospital’s partnership with Baylor College of Medicine drives research and the development of advanced treatments, some exclusive to the institution. U.S. News & World Report named Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center a “Best Regional Hospital” for 2026-27, ranking it third in Houston and fifth in Texas. Baylor St. Luke’s was the first hospital in Texas and the Southwest to be designated a Magnet hospital for nursing excellence by the American Nurses Credentialing Center, and it has received the award six consecutive times. For patients seeking an elevated experience, the hospital also offers The Terrace Suites, featuring upgraded accommodations and personalized amenities. The hospital also appears on Newsweek‘s list of World’s Best Hospitals for 2026. The medical center was the first hospital in the U.S. to install and begin clinical use of Allia Moveo, a groundbreaking new imaging system designed to support complex, minimally invasive procedures.
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (Boston). Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, an academic medical center affiliated with Harvard Medical School, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Boston Red Sox, operates 766 licensed beds and handles more than 4,600 births, 39,000 inpatient discharges, 55,000 emergency department visits and 760,000 outpatient visits each year. The medical center is part of Cambridge, Mass.-based Beth Israel Lahey Health, a system spanning academic medical centers, teaching hospitals, and community and specialty hospitals with more than 4,700 physicians and 39,000 employees. U.S. News & World Report’s 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” rankings placed Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center as the No. 3 hospital in both the Boston metro area and Massachusetts. The medical center ranked among the nation’s top 50 hospitals in eight specialties, including No.4 in obstetrics and gynecology, No. 9 in diabetes and endocrinology, No. 26 in gastroenterology and GI surgery and No. 28 in cancer care. The medical center’s research enterprise includes more than 250 principal investigators, who are all Harvard Medical School faculty, leading more than 2,500 active sponsored projects. The medical center draws more than $300 million in annual research funding, consistently ranking among the nation’s top independent hospitals for National Institutes of Health support. The medical center’s findings regularly appear in leading journals including Nature, Science, Cell and The New England Journal of Medicine.
Boston Children’s Hospital. For more than 150 years, Boston Children’s Hospital has advanced pediatric care worldwide, and Newsweek named it the best children’s hospital in the U.S. for 2026 among its “World’s Best Specialized Hospitals” in pediatrics. Boston Children’s has been included on U.S. News & World Report‘s honor roll of the top 10 children’s hospitals every year since the rankings began in 2007. The hospital has also been named a “Leader in LGBTQ Healthcare Equality” by the Healthcare Equality Index. Boston Children’s operates the world’s largest and most highly funded pediatric research enterprise, investing $603 million in externally sponsored research in fiscal year 2024 and leading the nation in federal funding to children’s hospitals. The hospital’s roughly 550 Harvard Medical School faculty members produce 80 to 100 research publications each week, and the research enterprise has spun out more than 50 startup companies over the past 20 years. Boston Children’s will add to its approximately 1 million square feet of research space with a new building before the end of the decade, expanding its laboratory space by about 20%. As part of its “Transforming Tomorrow” expansion, the hospital is modernizing existing facilities and building a new ambulatory surgical center to address near-capacity occupancy and a growing number of complex patients.
Boston Medical Center. As New England’s largest essential hospital, the 654-bed flagship academic medical center blends clinical excellence with a deep commitment to access and equity. As the primary teaching affiliate of Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, Boston Medical Center is a national leader in research, ranking second among essential hospitals for National Institutes of Health funding and producing over 1,600 research publications in fiscal year 2025. It is nationally ranked in geriatrics, neurology and neurosurgery, urology, and gastroenterology & GI surgery by U.S. News & World Report for 2026–27, and named “Best Regional Hospital” and “Best Regional Hospital for Community Access.” Two specialties and 11 procedures and conditions were recognized as “high-performing.” The medical center is home to New England’s largest sickle cell disease center and in 2023 became the region’s first hospital to offer breakthrough gene therapies for sickle cell disease. It delivers culturally responsive care through the region’s most extensive interpreter services program, providing translation in over 150 languages for a highly diverse patient population. The hospital also redefines innovation through first-in-the-nation programs addressing social and environmental drivers of health, including “Clean Power Prescription” and rooftop urban farming initiatives. In 2026, 187 Boston Medical Center physicians were named “Top Doctors” by Castle Connolly and Boston Magazine. Practice Greenhealth recognized it with a “Circles of Excellence Award” and the medical center earned recognition from Castle Connolly, Forbes, Newsweek and The Joint Commission for excellence in clinical care, workforce culture and sustainability.
Brigham and Women’s Hospital (Boston). A leading destination for complex and specialized care, Brigham and Women’s Hospital serves patients from across the U.S. and more than 120 countries and is a founding member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system. A major teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School, the Brigham is recognized on U.S. News & World Report’s 2026 honor roll, with nationally ranked programs in cancer, heart and vascular care, endocrinology, neurology and neurosurgery, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics and urology. Through a network of 1,200 physicians and 150 outpatient practices across Mass General Brigham, patients have streamlined access to coordinated specialty and community-based care throughout one of the nation’s leading integrated health systems. The hospital also plays a central role in the Mass General Brigham Research Institute, launched in 2025 and co-anchored by Brigham and Women’s and Massachusetts General Hospital. The institute brings together more than $2 billion in systemwide research activity, including 3,700 principal investigators and 16,000 scientists advancing breakthroughs in areas such as AI, gene therapy, cancer, neuroscience and global health. Complementing its leadership in research, the Brigham is advancing quality through “For Every Patient,” Mass General Brigham’s unified quality strategy, helping drive a culture of high reliability and clinical excellence. Recent Vizient data ranks the hospital among the nation’s top academic medical centers for overall quality and mortality outcomes.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center (Los Angeles). Cedars-Sinai Medical Center tied for No. 1 in California and has been named to U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Hospitals” honor roll for 10 consecutive years, with national rankings in 11 specialties. The medical center runs 732 active clinical trials, and in 2025 its investigators developed and successfully tested a new treatment for pregnant women with severe early preeclampsia, a leading cause of premature birth and maternal and fetal death. The Cedars-Sinai system is also expanding its academic footprint, with Cedars-Sinai Health Sciences University marking its first full year in 2025, and enrollment across its medical disciplines and programs reaching 1,008 by 2026. The system opened Cedars-Sinai Clinic London in 2025, its first flagship outpatient clinic outside the U.S. Cedars-Sinai’s division of thoracic surgery is using robotic tools through a single small incision to perform same-day biopsy and surgery that speeds recovery, while an FDA-approved expandable heart stent developed at the medical center is reducing the need for repeat operations in infants born with narrowed blood vessels. In 2025, the broader Cedars-Sinai system awarded $21 million to Los Angeles nonprofits, part of more than $200 million in grantmaking to roughly 300 nonprofits across the county since 2012.
Children’s Hospital Colorado (Aurora). Children’s Hospital Colorado on the Anschutz Medical Campus is part of the Rocky Mountain region’s leading pediatric health system and repeatedly a top 10 children’s hospital according to U.S. News & World Report. The hospital cares for more children than any hospital in the region as one of four hospitals, a network of specialty and primary care locations, and more than 400 outreach clinics serving Colorado and neighboring states. With more than 3,000 pediatric specialists and 9,500 team members, Children’s Hospital Colorado provides highly specialized care, including the region’s only level 1 pediatric trauma center while also advancing comprehensive behavioral health services to address the growing needs of children and adolescents. Children’s Colorado is also a national leader in pediatric innovation and research, supported by $192.6 million in annual research funding in 2025 through its partnership with the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. Recent advances include the hospital’s first dual heart-liver transplant, the expansion of transformative therapies for children with complex conditions, and pioneering work in pharmacogenomics and whole-genome sequencing to personalize treatment. The organization is also advancing new immunotherapy approaches for childhood leukemia and leading research in pediatric infectious diseases, cystic fibrosis and youth-onset Type 2 diabetes.
Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. Children’s Hospital Los Angeles is the largest provider of pediatric hospital care in California and the state’s largest pediatric safety-net provider. The hospital accounts for nearly 40% of pediatric beds in Los Angeles County and treats 46% of the county’s children who require complex care, as nearly 75% of its patients are covered by Medicaid. The hospital has been named to U.S. News & World Report‘s honor roll for best children’s hospitals for 17 consecutive years and ranks among the top 10 children’s hospitals nationally for National Institutes of Health research funding, supporting nearly 600 active clinical trials through its Saban Research Institute. This year marked the hospital’s 125th anniversary. CHLA operates one of the largest complex pediatric cardiac surgical programs in the country, as well as one of the first and largest pediatric CAR T-cell therapy programs, offering the most comprehensive portfolio of FDA-approved cell and gene therapies on the West Coast, with 12 such therapies currently available. In April 2026, CHLA launched the Chuck Lorre Pediatric Health Education Institute, a first-of-its-kind program expected to train more than 12,000 health care professionals over the next two decades. CHLA leads the nation in pediatric liver transplant outcomes, posting the best one- and three-year survival rates in the country, and in 2025 its surgeons performed a transplant on a 2-week-old infant, as well as synchronous liver transplants on two pediatric patients using portions of the same donated liver. The hospital also opened a new cardiac imaging suite featuring low-field MRI technology, a first for a pediatric hospital in the U.S.
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Founded in 1855 as the nation’s first hospital dedicated exclusively to children, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia has a long history of advancing pediatric medicine and caring for children with rare and complex conditions. CHOP is home to more than 1,160 principal investigators and a robust research enterprise focused on translating scientific discoveries into new treatments and therapies. Several notable medical advances originated there, including the first FDA-approved cell therapy for cancer and the first FDA-approved gene therapy for congenital blindness. In 2025, CHOP treated the first patient in the world with a personalized CRISPR gene-editing therapy, marking a significant milestone in the application of individualized medicine. Beyond research and clinical care, CHOP invests in programs that address behavioral health, community violence, food insecurity, housing instability, and other factors that influence child health and wellbeing. CHOP has been recognized among the nation’s leading pediatric hospitals by U.S. News & World Report for 19 consecutive years, and in 2026 was named one of Fast Company’s “World’s Most Innovative Companies,” leading the healthcare category.
Children’s Medical Center Dallas. Children’s Medical Center Dallas anchors Children’s Health, which has served as North Texas’s leading pediatric health system for more than 113 years. In partnership with Dallas-based UT Southwestern Medical Center, Children’s Medical Center Dallas has been nationally recognized by U.S. News & World Report across all 11 pediatric specialties for eight consecutive years and 14 times since 2008. Its heart center has performed more pediatric heart transplants than any program in the nation for three consecutive years, completing 26 heart transplants in 2025 alone, more than any other freestanding pediatric hospital in the country. The hospital campus spans 1.88 million square feet with 488 licensed beds and more than 6,100 team members, and it houses the only level 1 pediatric trauma center in North Texas along with a level 4 neonatal intensive care unit. The broader Children’s Health system has held Magnet designation for nursing excellence since 2009, and in 2024 it became the first and only health system in the nation to receive level 1 and 2 designations from the American College of Surgeons’ children’s surgery verification program at multiple hospitals. In 2024, Children’s Health and UT Southwestern broke ground on a $5 billion, 4.9-million-square-foot pediatric campus in Dallas, expected to open in 2031 with 552 inpatient rooms, 90 emergency exam rooms, 20 operating rooms and the largest level 4 neonatal intensive care unit in Dallas. Children’s Health currently supports more than 370 clinical trials across more than 50 pediatric specialty and subspecialty programs, including access to new gene therapies for rare and complex genetic diseases.
Children’s National Hospital (Washington, D.C.). For 155 years, Children’s National Hospital has delivered pediatric care as the Washington, D.C. region’s only standalone children’s hospital, caring for 259,416 unique patients from all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico in fiscal year 2025. U.S. News & World Report ranks Children’s National among the nation’s top 10 pediatric hospitals and tied for No. 1 children’s hospital in the Mid-Atlantic region. The hospital recorded 13,850 annual admissions with an average length of stay of 7.88 days. Home to the Children’s National Research Institute and the Sheikh Zayed Institute for Pediatric Surgical Innovation, Children’s National draws more than 75% of its research funding from federal agencies, including 49% from the National Institutes of Health. Children’s National is also a recognized advocate on local, state and federal pediatric health policy, often among the first consulted as legislation is developed. Families at Children’s National also benefit from a partnership with Disney, which brings its storytelling and characters into the hospital to create a more comforting patient experience.
Christiana Hospital (Newark, Del.). ChristianaCare’s 1,039-bed flagship academic medical center includes Delaware’s only level 1 trauma center, the only one between Baltimore and Philadelphia. In 2026, ChristianaCare Hospitals were ranked No. 1 in Delaware by U.S. News & World Report, and Christiana Hospital earned an “A” hospital safety grade from The Leapfrog Group. Its medical ICU has maintained American Association of Critical-Care Nurses “Beacon” recognition since 2009 and is Delaware’s most highly awarded Beacon unit. The Center for Heart & Vascular Health earned the American College of Cardiology’s HeartCARE Center national distinction of excellence for a fifth consecutive year in 2024 and integrates five cardiovascular specialties in one location. Christiana Hospital is Delaware’s only comprehensive stroke center and has the state’s only epilepsy monitoring unit, with rapid EEG technology introduced in 2024 that can identify suspected seizures in minutes. Its Center for Women’s & Children’s Health is the state’s only high-risk delivering hospital, with one of the nation’s few neonatal ICUs offering couplet care, and was the state’s only hospital named among Newsweek’s 2026 America’s Best Maternity Hospitals. At the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute, clinical-trial participation is about seven times the national average. In 2025, the National Cancer Institute renewed a $16.3 million grant supporting the nation’s only collaboration between an NCI-designated basic cancer center and an NCI community oncology research program, giving the partnership its highest possible rating and advancing first-in-human oncology trials.
Cincinnati Children’s. Cincinnati Children’s advances child health through expert clinical care, transformative research and innovations that shape pediatric medicine worldwide. Consistently ranked among the nation’s top children’s hospitals by U.S. News & World Report, with No. 1 rankings in cancer care, gastroenterology and GI surgery, and diabetes and endocrinology, Cincinnati Children’s numbers more than 1.7 million patient encounters annually. It is among the nation’s top recipients of pediatric research funding from National Institutes of Health and is internationally recognized for accelerating discoveries into clinical care. Its researchers and clinicians are advancing genomics, precision medicine, fetal therapy, rare disease treatment and pediatric behavioral health to improve outcomes for children globally. It is also a leader in quality improvement, patient safety and high reliability, helping healthcare systems worldwide adopt proven methods that improve care. Home to the nation’s largest inpatient pediatric mental health program, Cincinnati Children’s has made significant investments to expand access to behavioral health services and address one of the most pressing challenges facing children’s health. Through its partnership with University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati Children’s educates future pediatric leaders while building on a legacy of breakthroughs ranging from the oral polio vaccine to proton therapy, bettering outcomes for all children.
City of Hope (Duarte, Calif.). One of the nation’s largest, most advanced cancer research and treatment organizations, City of Hope is home to a National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center with the highest possible “exceptional” rating. Ranked among the top hospitals for cancer care by U.S. News & World Report and the no. 1 in Southern California, City of Hope is known for transforming research into treatments for cancer and related life-threatening illnesses, including diabetes, sickle cell and HIV. Its scientists have pioneered breakthroughs such as monoclonal antibodies, the foundational technology for human synthetic insulin, and next-generation immunotherapies that now benefit more than 100 million people worldwide. With more than 2,000 scientists and clinicians, City of Hope leverages state-of-the-art laboratories and on-site biomanufacturing to accelerate CAR T cell therapies and advanced cellular treatments from discovery to patient care at unprecedented speed. A partnership with the Translational Genomics Research Institute also expands its precision medicine capabilities. Committed to increasing access to advanced cancer treatments, City of Hope operates cancer centers in five major U.S. metropolitan areas and has developed one of the nation’s most advanced clinical trial networks, ensuring more people participate in promising investigational studies. One of the largest philanthropic organizations in cancer medicine enables City of Hope to continue advancing discoveries year-after-year, expand access to care and ensure that lifesaving treatments reach more people, faster.
Cleveland Clinic. Cleveland Clinic was founded in 1921, and its Main Campus is the 173-acre flagship medical center for the broader system, which boasts 83,000 caregivers, 23 hospitals and 300 outpatient facilities worldwide, caring for 3.6 million unique patients, logging 995,000 emergency department visits, and functioning with an operating revenue of $18.3 billion. Cleveland Clinic researchers are advancing precision medicine, genomic medicine, population health, immuno-oncology and emerging technologies such as quantum computing. In partnership with the State of Ohio and JobsOhio, Cleveland Clinic launched the $500 million Global Center for Pathogen & Human Health Research to study pandemic threats and develop new diagnostics, vaccines and treatments. The center anchors Ohio’s $1 billion investment in the Cleveland Innovation District, a biomedical hub also anchored by Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland State University, Cleveland-based MetroHealth System and Cleveland-based University Hospitals. For the 36th consecutive year, Cleveland Clinic earned a spot on U.S. News & World Report’s 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” honor roll, ranking among the top 20 hospitals nationwide and No. 1 in Ohio.
Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (Lebanon, N.H.). The nation’s most rural academic medical center, Dartmouth Health’s Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center is home to the Center for Rural Health Care Delivery Science. While nearly 20% of Americans live in rural areas and experience greater health challenges than those in cities, research in this field is limited. Disrupting that trend, the mentorship model supports early-career researchers focused on rural health disparities to develop data, system infrastructure and community partnerships to improve rural health. Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center is consistently ranked New Hampshire’s No. 1 hospital by U.S. News & World Report, it has the state’s only level 1 adult and level 2 pediatric trauma center, children’s hospital and the only NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center in the U.S that’s not located in an urban hub. It is also the only federal-designated level 2 special pathogen treatment center in Northern New England, equipped to care for high-consequence infectious diseases. Among many innovations helping patients is Dartmouth Health and New Hampshire Legal Assistance program, which allows healthcare providers to connect to patients directly with an on-site attorney for consultations, advice and representation for non-criminal legal issues that impact overall health and wellness. The medical center’s new prescription solution significantly reduces environmental waste and enhances sustainability by using compostable, paper-based and curbside-recyclable prescription bottles for patients’ medications. It also received a federal grant to launch the North Country Maternity Network to address rural maternity gaps, since nearly half of New Hampshire’s labor and delivery units have closed over 25 years.
Emory University Hospital (Atlanta). Emory University Hospital, first founded as Wesley Memorial Hospital with 50 beds in an Atlanta mansion in March 1904, moved to its current site on the Emory University campus in November 1922 with the help of a $1.25 million gift. The hospital was renamed Emory University Hospital in the mid-1930s and today operates more than 700 beds as Emory Healthcare’s flagship academic institution. In 2014, the hospital’s serious communicable diseases unit cared for the first patients treated for Ebola virus in the U.S. In 2017, Emory University Hospital opened a new nine-story tower connected to its historic building by a two-story walking bridge. The hospital is a national leader in cancer, cardiology and heart surgery, neurology and neurosurgery, and solid organ and bone marrow transplant. Emory University Hospital and Children’s Arthur M. Blank Hospital form a combined regional emerging special pathogen treatment center, one of only 13 in the country with specialized training to care for patients with highly contagious infectious diseases. In June 2025, the two hospitals joined more than 50 federal, state, local and international collaborators in “Tranquil Passport,” the largest patient movement exercise in U.S. Department of Health and Human Services history involving patients with a highly contagious infectious disease.
Franciscan Health Indianapolis. Franciscan Health Indianapolis houses the only full-service heart and vascular care program on the south side of Indianapolis. The hospital has been named one of “America’s 250 Best Hospitals” for 2026 by Healthgrades, marking its fourth consecutive year receiving the honor. In U.S. News & World Report‘s 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” rankings, Franciscan Health Indianapolis was ranked the highest-performing hospital in the state of Indiana. Franciscan Health Indianapolis is rated high performing in 13 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve surgery, back surgery, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and colon cancer surgery. The hospital was previously named one of the 100 top hospitals in the U.S. by Truven Health Analytics.
Hackensack Meridian Hackensack (N.J.) University Medical Center. Hackensack University Medical Center, founded in 1888, was the first hospital in New Jersey and second in the nation to earn Magnet recognition for nursing excellence, and it now holds its seventh consecutive Magnet designation from the American Nurses Credentialing Center. In 2025, U.S. News & World Report made the medical center the first hospital in the state to be listed among the nation’s top 20 hospitals. For 2026-27, the hospital was named No. 1 in the state, while the medical center once again secured an “A” hospital safety grade from The Leapfrog Group. The medical center’s research portfolio spans precision medicine, translational medicine, immunotherapy, cell therapy and vaccine development, supporting an academic medical center that also trains residents through the Hackensack Meridian School of Medicine’s three-year program. The hospital’s hospital-at-home program helps prevent readmissions and unnecessary emergency room visits. Recent clinical innovations include the Medtronic PulseSelect Pulsed Field Ablation System for atrial fibrillation, the Symplicity Spyral renal denervation system for treatment-resistant high blood pressure, and an extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation program for patients in cardiac arrest. Hackensack Meridian John Theurer Cancer Center, based at the medical center, became the first in the state to install the RefleXion X1 machine with SCINTIX biology-guided radiotherapy, a new treatment option for patients with lung and bone tumors.
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia). The Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, a cornerstone of Penn Medicine, combines advanced science with patient-centered care and is a hub for biomedical discovery and innovation. Founded as the nation’s first university-owned teaching hospital, it has spent over 150 years translating knowledge into better treatments and outcomes. Closely linked with the Perelman School of Medicine and the University of Pennsylvania, it moves promising insights from the laboratory to the bedside while training the next generation of health professionals. The hospital includes the Clifton Center for Medical Breakthroughs, a 1.5 million-square-foot, 17-story facility that is the largest capital project in university history. The center houses inpatient care for cardiology and cardiac surgery; medical and surgical oncology; neurology and neurosurgery; thoracic, vascular, and transplant surgery, and two-story emergency department. An advanced epilepsy monitoring unit and human neurophysiology research laboratory strengthen the connection between neuroscience research and neurological care. The Penn Transplant Institute, with 60 years of changing lives through organ donation and transplantation, performed over 15,000 solid-organ transplants since its founding as the region’s largest transplant center. With a long record of medical firsts, Penn Medicine teams helped shape modern healthcare, from CAR T cell therapy to the Nobel Prize-winning mRNA technology behind Covid-19 vaccines. Since 2013, researchers made essential contributions through foundational research and clinical trials to at least 55 FDA approvals. Penn Medicine is a $12.5 billion enterprise powered by more than 50,000 faculty and staff.
Houston Methodist Hospital. Houston Methodist Hospital, the flagship hospital of Houston Methodist, was founded in 1919 and is headquartered within the Texas Medical Center in Houston. The hospital has more than 900 beds, 8,400 employees and six centers of excellence, while the broader Houston Methodist system comprises eight hospitals, numerous specialty care locations and more than 35,000 employees. U.S. News & World Report has ranked Houston Methodist Hospital among the country’s top hospitals in 11 specialties in its 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” rankings and named it the No. 1 hospital in Texas for the 15th time in a row. The hospital’s six centers of excellence, comprising the Houston Methodist Cancer Center, DeBakey Heart & Vascular Center, J.C. Walter Jr. Transplant Center, Underwood Center for Digestive Health, Neurological Institute, and Orthopedics & Sports Medicine, each combine clinical treatment, research and education. Houston Methodist Hospital has marked 100 years of providing clinical care, advanced technology and patient experience since its founding.
Inova Fairfax Hospital (Fairfax, Va.). Consistently recognized as a national leader in safety, quality and patient experience, Inova Fairfax Hospital received “A” grades from The Leapfrog Group for 16 consecutive periods and CMS’ highest 5-star overall quality rating for nine consecutive years. The hospital ranks No. 2 in Virginia and in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area by U.S. News & World Report for 2026–27, including national rankings in obstetrics and gynecology. Its L.J. Murphy Children’s Hospital also ranks for neonatology, operating as the home of Virginia’s only level 4 neonatal ICU. The 928-bed campus is the largest hospital in the Northern Virginia and Washington, D.C. region. Home to Northern Virginia’s only level 1 trauma center, it is the nation’s fourth busiest emergency department, with nearly 185,000 annual visits, and a $161 million expansion that will add capacity and improve access, patient flow and timely care. The adult emergency department has the region’s first “EmPATH” unit, a behavioral health model offering rapid assessment and stabilization for patients experiencing a mental health crisis in a therapeutic environment. In 2026, Inova Fairfax performed the region’s first histotripsy procedure for liver tumors and added new GE HealthCare MRI technology to advance AI-enabled cardiac imaging. The campus opened a new $20 million donor care unit, the dedicated organ recovery center serving Northern Virginia, Washington, D.C. and Maryland. Meanwhile, the broader Inova system is the first health system in Virginia and Mid-Atlantic to use advanced fluorescent imaging during ovarian cancer surgery.
Intermountain Health St. George (Utah) Regional Hospital. Intermountain Health St. George Regional Hospital is a more than 280-bed medical center that serves as the primary healthcare referral hub for southern Utah, northwestern Arizona and southeastern Nevada. U.S. News & World Report ranked the hospital No. 1 in Utah this year. The hospital is fully accredited by The Joint Commission and operates as a level 2 trauma center, caring for nearly all trauma patients except major pediatric trauma cases. The Intermountain Cancer Center at St. George Regional Hospital earned ASTRO APEx accreditation, a voluntary, multistep, consensus-based external review of the safety, quality and patient-centeredness of its radiation oncology program. Through Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Health’s precision genomics program, the hospital partners with Stanford University. St. George Regional Hospital’s name has evolved over the past century alongside the growth of St. George City, and it now draws patients from local, national and international communities.
Johns Hopkins Hospital (Baltimore). Founded in 1889, The Johns Hopkins Hospital is widely recognized as a birthplace of modern academic medicine and as a preeminent global academic medical center. It was again named to the U.S. News & World Report honor roll for 2026–2027, with nationally ranked programs in 15 adult and 10 pediatric specialties. It was also named the No. 1 hospital in Maryland. As the flagship hospital of Johns Hopkins Medicine, it helped define integration of exceptional patient care, groundbreaking biomedical research and world-class medical education. It brings together internationally renowned clinicians, physician-scientists and multidisciplinary teams to care for some of the world’s most medically complex patients while advancing discoveries shaping medicine’s future. Home to 2,400 full-time attending physicians and one of the largest graduate medical education programs, it is a global destination for tertiary and quaternary care, pioneering clinical research and innovation. For over a century, Johns Hopkins transformed medicine through discoveries changing the course of patient care, pioneering the first “Blue Baby” heart surgery that became the foundation of modern pediatric cardiac surgery, advancing lifesaving transplantation innovations and developing new surgical approaches for complex diseases. Groundbreaking precision medicine work includes brain tumor detection through cerebrospinal fluid testing and innovative therapies for neurological disorders. Its commitment to excellence is seen in over two decades of Magnet nursing designation, an “A” Leapfrog hospital safety grade and a 5-star overall hospital quality rating from CMS, achieved by only 12% of U.S. hospitals.
Keck Hospital of USC (Los Angeles). Keck Hospital of USC, the flagship hospital of Keck Medicine of USC, cares for patients with some of the most complex medical conditions nationwide. Keck Hospital offers access to hundreds of active clinical trials, including early-stage cellular therapies produced on-site at the nationally ranked USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, one of only eight original National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers. Keck Hospital physicians include experts from USC Urology, a pioneer in advanced robotic urologic oncologic surgeries, including the world’s first bladder transplant, and the USC Cardiac and Vascular Institute, the first in Los Angeles to successfully implant a left ventricular assist device on both the left and right sides of the heart. The USC Transplant Institute also performed the first adult living donor transplant without a blood transfusion and the second dual organ living organ donation swap in the U.S. with kidney and liver. Vizient ranks Keck Hospital among the nation’s top 12 academic hospitals for delivering high-quality care. Keck Hospital is also a “Top Teaching Hospital” and earned its 12th “A” hospital safety grade, both accolades from The Leapfrog Group. The hospital ranks among the top six in California and is the highest ranked neurology and neurosurgery program in Southern California, according to 2026-27 U.S. News & World Report. Keck Hospital became the first healthcare facility in the U.S. to eliminate the use of nitrous oxide for anesthesia, replacing it with equally effective, environmentally sustainable alternatives, earning the hospital a 2026 Practice Greenhealth ”Environmental Excellence Award.”
MUSC Health–University Medical Center (Charleston, S.C.). MUSC Health University Medical Center, located in historic downtown Charleston, serves as the hub for MUSC Health’s clinical services and comprises the Institute of Psychiatry, Children’s Hospital, Ashley River Tower and University Hospital. The medical center is home to the National Cancer Institute-designated MUSC Hollings Cancer Center and South Carolina’s only solid organ transplant center. It also houses a level 1 trauma center and is one of only two national telehealth centers of excellence in the country. Beyond Charleston, MUSC Health extends patient care across South Carolina through satellite offices. For the 12th consecutive year, U.S. News & World Report ranked MUSC Health University Medical Center the No. 1 hospital in South Carolina in its 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” rankings. The recognition highlights the strength of the hospital’s obstetrics and gynecology program, along with numerous other specialties rated “high-performing” for delivering care above the national average.
Maine Medical Center (Portland). MaineHealth Maine Medical Center is a multi-campus medical center with 929 licensed beds, and employs about 9,000 care team members. The medical center is accredited by the Joint Commission, and its Portland location has received Magnet recognition for nursing excellence four consecutive times. The Portland campus provides tertiary-level care and is verified as a level 1 trauma center, while the Biddeford and Sanford locations operate as community hospitals offering inpatient-based services. As part of MaineHealth, a nonprofit integrated health system, Maine Medical Center offers patients access to a network of specialists, pediatric care, behavioral health services, diagnostic services, home health, hospice and senior care. The medical center is also an academic medical center, training residents, fellows, medical students, nursing students and surgical technicians, and has continuously evolved to meet community needs since admitting its first patients in 1874. In U.S. News & World Report‘s 2026-2027 “Best Hospitals” rankings, Maine Medical Center’s Portland campus was ranked the No. 1 hospital in Maine and No. 1 in the Portland area.
Massachusetts General Hospital (Boston). A founding member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system, Massachusetts General Hospital has been ranked among the top hospitals in the nation by U.S. News & World Report for 2026-27, earning a spot on the honor roll, the No. 1 spot for psychiatry, and top honors for ophthalmology, ear, nose and throat in partnership with Boston’s Mass Eye and Ear, as well as for neurology, neurosurgery, diabetes and endocrinology, cardiology and heart surgery. As part of Mass General Brigham’s first-ever unified quality strategy, “For Every Patient,” the hospital is driving a culture of high reliability and exceptional clinical performance, with the latest Vizient data showing the hospital as a top performer in overall quality and mortality among academic medical centers. The original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School, the hospital is home to the largest hospital-based research program in the U.S., with $1 billion in research operations, allowing patients to access the newest clinical trials and latest disease treatments. In 2025, Mass General Brigham system announced the formation of the Mass General Brigham Research Institute, which is co-anchored by Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital to harness the system’s more than $2 billion in research activities. The institute is home to 3,700 principal Investigators and 16,000 scientists who are pioneering discoveries in fields ranging from AI and gene therapy to cancer, neuroscience, and global health to drive greater impact and push the boundaries of scientific discovery. In 2027, Massachusetts General Hospital will open the 1 million-square foot Herb Chambers Tower of the Phillip and Susan Ragon Building, followed by the New Balance Foundation Tower in 2030.
Mayo Clinic (Rochester, Minn.). Mayo Clinic is the largest integrated, nonprofit medical group practice in the world, with roots dating back nearly 150 years when its founders pioneered an integrated, team-based approach to medicine. Mayo Clinic has earned more top rankings for high-quality patient care than any other healthcare organization and has more specialties ranked in the top three nationally than any other hospital. The organization’s innovation efforts include Mayo Clinic Platform, which powers technologies aimed at changing how care is delivered. Mayo Clinic’s flagship Rochester campus draws over 1 million patients each year. The organization as a whole has committed $100 million to eliminate racism and advance health equity within Mayo Clinic and beyond. Mayo Clinic has also pledged a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions intensity and a 20% reduction in energy use within 10 years. The hospital is currently in the midst of a $5 billion expansion initiative to redesign Mayo Clinic’s Rochester campus, aiming to create “healthcare neighborhoods” for more seamless patient care delivery by 2030.
Miriam Hospital (Providence, R.I.). The Miriam Hospital ranked first among Rhode Island hospitals in U.S. News & World Report’s 2026-2027 rankings, marking the 15th consecutive year the hospital has been named a best regional hospital. The hospital has maintained Magnet recognition for nursing excellence since 1998, making it one of only four hospitals worldwide to hold the designation for seven consecutive cycles. The hospital is staffed by more than 816 physicians, a nursing staff of 650, approximately 50 full-time house staff and more than 2,800 employees, and serves as a major teaching affiliate of the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. The hospital was the first in Rhode Island certified by the Joint Commission as a primary stroke center and has received the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s “Gold” or “Gold Plus” designation for stroke care every year since 2008. The Center for Bariatric Surgery at The Miriam Hospital was reaccredited in 2021 as a center of excellence by the American College of Surgeons’ metabolic and bariatric surgery accreditation and quality improvement program, and its Total Joint Center holds the Joint Commission’s “Gold Seal of Approval” for total knee and hip replacement. In March 2019, IBM Watson Health named The Miriam Hospital among the top 100 hospitals in the nation as part of the major teaching hospitals category. A founding partner of Providence-based Brown University Health, The Miriam Hospital marks a century of milestones in 2026.
Mississippi Baptist Medical Center (Jackson). Mississippi Baptist Medical Center, Jackson’s first hospital, has served the community for more than a century and is now part of Memphis, Tenn.-based Baptist Memorial Health Care, one of the largest nonprofit health care networks in the country. The medical center offers a broad range of services, including cancer treatment through the Baptist Cancer Center, maternity and women’s health, physician-guided weight loss and bariatric surgery, and a nationally recognized orthopedic program. The medical center is also a leader in cardiovascular care through Baptist Heart, along with neurology, neurosurgery and rehabilitation services. In March 2017, Mississippi Baptist Medical Center became the first and only hospital in Mississippi to earn Magnet designation for nursing excellence, and it was redesignated in August 2023. Today, the medical center admits approximately 21,000 hospital patients and performs more than 220,000 outpatient procedures each year.
MemorialCare Long Beach (Calif.) Medical Center. With continual high ranks in U.S. News & World Report, Healthgrades, Newsweek and other leading organizations, Long Beach Medical Center is a renowned teaching hospital. Located alongside MemorialCare Miller Children’s & Women’s Hospital, it is one of Southland’s only campuses where children, especially those with chronic conditions, receive a lifetime of care on one site. Together, the hospitals are the West’s second largest campus, known for innovations in many clinical areas. The medical center’s five consecutive years as one of “America’s Best Hospitals” for obstetrics and gynecology is grounded in its history as the first U.S. hospital-based perinatology program and one of the nation’s largest neonatal ICUs. With 20,000 tests and treatments annually, MemorialCare Heart & Vascular Institute’s many firsts began over 75 years ago with co-invention of the modern-day maximum stress tests to detect heart issues, saving millions of lives globally. Other global firsts include a blood test to determine myocardial infarction, a cardiology computer registry, among the first blood banks for open heart surgery, and revolutionizing the placement, size and longevity of pacemakers. Cancer innovations include among the nation’s first community breast health centers, which along with MemorialCare sister hospitals now screen 75,000 annually in several locations, and radiation oncology breakthroughs resulting in procedures named after its pioneering physicians. Home to countless orthopedic advances, it made history with the world’s first robotic hip revision using Mako Total Hip with 5.0 software. It is also a seven-year honoree of Newsweek‘s “Best Hospitals” overall list.
Montefiore Einstein Hospital–Moses Campus (Bronx, N.Y.). Montefiore Einstein Hospital–Moses Campus is the flagship hospital for Montefiore Einstein, one of New York’s leading academic health systems. In 2025, the Moses Campus received a $4.5 million grant from the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation, the largest nursing-focused grant in Montefiore Einstein’s history. Montefiore is ranked among the top hospitals nationally and regionally by U.S. News & World Report. The broader Montefiore Einstein system offers a Community Health Worker Institute that has screened more than 340,000 individuals for social needs and connected more than 15,000 households to housing, food and transportation resources across the program. In addition, the system recently completed a new inpatient psychiatric center for children and adolescents that nearly doubled the number of child and adolescent inpatient psychiatric beds in the Bronx. The system is expanding its partnership with Amazon One Medical to increase access to primary and specialty care, and recently marked two decades of its Project Bravo Food Pantry, which supports Bronx residents by providing fresh produce and healthy food three days a week.
Mount Sinai Hospital (New York City). One of the nation’s largest academic medical centers and the flagship of Mount Sinai Health System, The Mount Sinai Hospital has appeared for 12 straight years in U.S. News & World Report‘s honor roll and shares the No. 1 spot for best hospital in the state. The 1,121-bed facility consistently receives top global, national and local rankings from Newsweek, and achieved Magnet designation five times. It is a global pioneer adopting AI tools to improve patient care, enhance clinical decision-making and increase operational efficiency. Its innovative voice-based AI system, “Ava,” was built into scheduling phone lines and answers questions at any hour of the night. It also created predictive AI models to help clinicians identify patients at high risk for conditions such as bedsores, delirium and cardiac events. Further AI applications include blood sugar monitoring after heart surgery, evaluating best cancer treatments, prioritizing interventions for those most likely to have a heart attack, studying sleep apnea, and tracking an infant’s tiniest movements in the neonatal ICU to detect a possible neurological abnormality. Mount Sinai is the first National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center in New York City to deploy an oncology-specific AI tool for systemwide clinical trial matching, expanding access to cancer research and connecting more patients across the health system to life-saving clinical trials.
MountainView Hospital (Las Vegas). MountainView Hospital is a full-service medical center in northwest Las Vegas that has served the surrounding community for decades, earning national recognition for quality and compassionate care across many specialties. The hospital employs 2,150 staff members and 1,200 physicians. MountainView is home to multiple nationally recognized programs, including a top cardiovascular and thoracic center, an integrated cardiology clinic and the Las Vegas Institute for Robotic Surgery, a designated center of excellence in robotic surgery. MountainView is the only hospital in Nevada to offer bone marrow transplants and to be accredited by the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy. The hospital also hosts the Sunrise Health Graduate Medical Education Consortium, which trains the next generation of physicians and surgeons for the community. In the 2026-27 ranking period, U.S. News & World Report named MountainView Hospital the No. 1 hospital in Nevada and the Las Vegas metro area for the second consecutive year.
NYU Langone Tisch Hospital and Kimmel Pavilion (New York City). NYU Langone Hospitals has been ranked the No. 1 comprehensive academic medical center in the nation by Vizient for four consecutive years, and U.S. News & World Report credits it with more No. 1-ranked specialties than any other hospital in the country, including neurology and neurosurgery for the fifth straight year, along with cardiology, pulmonology and geriatrics. The Tisch Hospital and Kimmel Pavilion campus serve as the flagship hospital of the NYU Langone Health system. Tisch Hospital boasts over 350 beds for patients who need inpatient care, as well as 66 state-of-the-art operating rooms, an advanced critical care unit and a neonatal ICU. The hospital is also home to the Comprehensive Stroke Center and Ronald O. Perelman Center for Emergency Services. The Helen L. and Martin S. Kimmel Pavilion offers 374 single-bed patient rooms, and provides general and subspecialty surgical services, cardiothoracic surgery, neurosurgery, neurology, hematology, bone marrow transplant and solid organ transplant services. The pavilion also has intensive care and step-down units for cardiology, neuroscience and surgery, 30 operating rooms and image-guided labs, and 4 procedural rooms. The hospital is supported by ambient AI documentation tools for inpatient and emergency department providers. The NYU Langone system recently received a $25 million National Institutes of Health award to establish the data hub for the national Complement-ARIE program, which is accelerating alternatives to animal testing through organ-on-a-chip systems and AI-driven models.
Nationwide Children’s Hospital (Columbus, Ohio). Nationwide Children’s Hospital employs more than 17,000 staff who handle more than 2 million patient visits annually and serves as home to the department of pediatrics of The Ohio State University College of Medicine. The hospital has earned a spot on U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Children’s Hospitals” honor roll for 12 consecutive years and, as of 2026, ranks among the top 10 pediatric facilities in the country and No. 1 in both Ohio and the Midwest. Nationwide Children’s holds a five-time Magnet designation for nursing excellence, and its Abigail Wexner Research Institute ranks among the top 10 National Institutes of Health-funded freestanding pediatric research centers in the country. The hospital’s “Healthy Neighborhoods Healthy Families” initiative has developed or otherwise impacted more than 1,000 homes in Columbus since 2008, and its school-based health program has delivered care to 58,000 children during the school day since 2015. Nationwide Children’s is currently building a new inpatient tower, scheduled to open in phases between 2027 and 2028, with dedicated floors for the neonatal ICU, pediatric ICU, and hematology and oncology services. Researchers recently achieved a first-in-the-U.S. milestone with FDA authorization to begin trials for CAR-NK cells created using CRISPR and AAV technology to treat high-risk acute myeloid leukemia. The hospital also received a $16 million grant to lead school-based suicide prevention studies and launched a mental health training program in partnership with the Joe Burrow Foundation.
Nebraska Medical Center (Omaha). Nebraska Medical Center is the state’s largest hospital, with an international reputation for breakthroughs in cancer care, organ transplant and infectious diseases. The academic medical center is led by more than 1,000 physicians and serves as the major teaching hospital for the University of Nebraska Medical Center. Home to the National Cancer Institute-designated Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center, Nebraska Medical Center recently marked 10 years of CAR-T cell therapy. Among the nation’s first to offer the treatment, its experts advanced CAR-T applications to conditions including lupus and multiple sclerosis. Federal health leaders called on the Nebraska biocontainment unit and national quarantine unit at the university medical center to monitor U.S. citizens who were aboard a cruise ship linked to a deadly hantavirus outbreak, just one of several times the unit has been called upon for biocontainment and quarantine. The hospital is an American College of Surgeons-verified level 1 trauma center, and the only Joint Commission-certified comprehensive stroke center in the region. It has held Magnet nursing excellence recognition since 2008 and has been named U.S. News & World Report‘s best hospital in Nebraska for 15 consecutive years. Nebraska Medical Center is the flagship facility for Nebraska Medicine, a $3 billion, 10,500-employee, health system that operates two hospitals and more than 70 specialty and primary care clinics, seeing approximately one million annual outpatient visits.
NewYork-Presbyterian Columbia University Irving Medical Center and Weill Cornell Medical Center (New York City). NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, based in New York City, is one of the nation’s largest and most comprehensive academic medical centers, with more than 4,000 beds, more than 10,000 affiliated physicians and 50,000 employees. The hospital sees more than 2 million visits annually, including close to 22,000 infant deliveries and more than 620,000 emergency department visits. Its Weill Cornell campus, NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, has 862 beds and includes major programs such as the Center for Advanced Digestive Care, Och Spine, the William Randolph Hearst Burn Center and the Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Program, which is the oldest kidney transplant program in New York state. U.S. News & World Report named NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital’s Columbia and Cornell campuses to its 2026-27 “Best Hospitals” honor roll for the 23rd consecutive year, and it was the only hospital in New York ranked in the top 20 across all 14 evaluated medical specialties. The hospital ranked in the top five nationally across eight specialties: No. 2 for cardiology and heart and vascular surgery, No. 2 for diabetes and endocrinology, obstetrics and gynecology, psychiatry, their collaborative program with New York City-based Hospital for Special Surgery for rheumatology at No. 3, neurology and neurosurgery at No. 4, orthopedics at No. 4 and No. 4 for urology. It also ranked No. 10 in both geriatrics and pulmonology, and continues to be recognized as a “Best Regional Hospital for Community Access” for its care of underserved communities.
Northwestern Memorial Hospital (Chicago). Northwestern Memorial Hospital anchors the Northwestern Medicine system and serves as the primary teaching affiliate for Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, a partnership that gives patients access to leading-edge clinical trials. The academic medical center, located in the heart of downtown Chicago, brings together physicians, surgeons and caregivers representing nearly every medical specialty. Northwestern Memorial Hospital is the only Illinois hospital ranked No. 1 in the state for 15 straight years by U.S. News & World Report, according to its 2026-2027 rankings, and the only Illinois hospital on the publication’s national honor roll for that same span. The hospital is nationally ranked in 10 clinical specialties and anchors the Northwestern Medicine system, which includes five hospitals ranked among “America’s Best.” Northwestern Memorial Hospital has also received Magnet recognition, the gold standard for nursing excellence, from the American Nurses Credentialing Center. In 2016, the American College of Healthcare Architects recognized the hospital with its “Legacy Project Award” for forward-thinking design, and Northwestern Memorial Hospital was among the first hospitals to dedicate private rooms to all patients, a practice it continues today. The hospital’s downtown medical campus includes Prentice Women’s Hospital, Feinberg Pavilion and Galter Pavilion, among other facilities, along with restaurants, retail and wellness offerings for the community. Northwestern Medicine recently received an anonymous philanthropic gift to launch the Robert Havey, MD, Institute for Primary Care, which will help expand access, develop team-based care models, train the next generation of primary care clinicians, and advance AI-enabled tools for patient engagement, clinical documentation and care delivery.
OU Health University of Oklahoma Medical Center (Oklahoma City). OU Health University of Oklahoma Medical Center is the state’s flagship academic medical center, located on the same campus as Oklahoma’s only freestanding children’s hospital and National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center. In addition, as one of four academic health campuses with seven health colleges, the majority of the state’s health professionals train there. It has over 1 million annual patient visits and is in the national top decile for quality, patient safety and employee engagement. OU College of Medicine is in the top 100 nationally for National Institutes of Health funding, among the top 3.6% of all NIH-funded U.S. institutions. OU Health Stephenson Cancer Center ranks among U.S. News & World Report‘s top 50 cancer centers and top in the state. The cancer center holds “Lead Academic Participating Site” status in NCI National Clinical Trials Network, a distinction shared by 32 centers. It is one of just nine sites in NCI’s Cancer Screening Research Network, extending trials to tribal, rural and urban populations. OU Health runs the state’s only phase 1 clinical trials and only adult bone marrow transplant and cellular therapy programs. Oklahoma Children’s OU Health, the state’s only comprehensive academic children’s hospital, ranks top in the state and top 50 nationally. Oklahoma Children’s operates the state’s only solid organ transplant and pediatric bone marrow and stem cell transplant programs. In 2026, physicians performed the state’s first intra-arterial chemotherapy for pediatric retinoblastoma, sparing young patients from having to leave the state for care. OU Health became the state’s first American College of Surgeons-verified level 1 trauma center in 2001 and only level 1 trauma center for adults and children.
Ochsner Medical Center–New Orleans. Ochsner Medical Center–New Orleans has been ranked the best hospital in Louisiana for 15 consecutive years by U.S. News & World Report and holds five-time Magnet designation from the American Nurses Credentialing Center. The medical center operates eight centers of excellence, including cancer care, heart and vascular services, neurosciences, transplant, orthopedics, pediatrics, primary care and robotic surgery. Similarly, its affiliated Ochsner Children’s Hospital has ranked among the nation’s top 50 children’s hospitals for eight consecutive years. As part of Ochsner Health, the medical center hosted the system’s 23rd Annual Research Week in May 2026, highlighting the system’s 450 active clinical research trials with 8,700 participants as of April 2026, along with advances in precision medicine such as next-generation sequencing to tailor treatment plans. Researchers also presented work on antibody-drug conjugates in gynecologic oncology and on colorectal cancer evolution, using blood- and tissue-based testing to better understand treatment response and resistance. Through innovationOchsner, the health system is developing digital health, advanced analytics and predictive modeling tools that Ochsner Medical Center–New Orleans will use to improve population health, patient experience and care team wellbeing.
The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center University Hospital (Columbus). In February 2026, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center opened its new University Hospital, the medical center’s flagship facility with 26 stories and 820 private rooms, making it the largest single-facility hospital project opening in the U.S. in 2026. A major referral center for patients throughout Ohio and the Midwest, the hospital features state-of-the-art diagnostic and treatment spaces, one of the busiest kidney and pancreas transplant centers in the world, and a maternity hospital with a level 3 neonatal ICU. The hospital is also a leader in minimally invasive surgery and advanced heart and gynecologic surgeries. The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center treats patients from all 50 states and 26 countries across its six hospitals, more than 100 facilities, and more than 61,000 annual inpatients and 3.3 million annual outpatient visits. Its Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute is the third-largest cancer hospital in the country and holds an “exceptional” ranking as a designated cancer program. The medical center ranks among the top 10 nationally in clinical trials, supported by 45 medical research institutes and centers, and has been named to U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Hospitals” list for 33 consecutive years, with nine nationally ranked specialties. The medical center holds its fifth Magnet designation for nursing excellence and a level 1 geriatric emergency department accreditation from the American College of Emergency Physicians. Its James Cancer Hospital recently launched the “BRIDGE” program to provide coordinated support for early-onset cancer patients, while medical center researchers are leading the “State of Ohio Adversity and Resilience Study,” examining risk factors for mental health and substance use disorders.
Oregon Health & Science University Hospital (Portland). Oregon Health & Science University Hospital is Oregon’s only public academic health center. It’s a level 1 trauma center that combines patient care, biomedical research and medical education. OHSU operates a system of hospitals and clinics across Oregon and southwest Washington, and its schools of medicine, nursing, pharmacy, dentistry and public health extend through a network of campuses and partners throughout the state. As Portland’s largest employer and a statewide economic engine, the hospital also serves as a national research hub, with thousands of scientists working to develop lifesaving therapies. U.S. News & World Report ranked OHSU the No. 1 hospital in Oregon for 2026-27. Additionally, four of OHSU’s adult specialties rank among the top 50 nationwide, including ophthalmology and cancer care, which both rank in the top 25. As a public organization, OHSU also provides services for the state’s most vulnerable residents and outreach to improve health in communities across Oregon. OHSU was the first center in Oregon to offer high-intensity focused ultrasound for treatment of tremor-dominant Parkinson’s disease and essential tremor, and was one of the first centers in the country to perform a new type of brain procedure to treat an intractable form of epilepsy.
Orlando (Fla.) Regional Medical Center. Orlando Regional Medical Center is an 808-bed hospital and the flagship medical center of Orlando Health, serving as one of the largest tertiary facilities in the region. For more than 100 years, the medical center has provided advanced surgical, medical, rehabilitative and emergency care. It houses as Central Florida’s first level 1 trauma center, which sees more than 85,000 patients annually, including 3,400 major trauma cases. The medical center’s burn center is verified by the American Burn Association, one of only a few in Florida to hold the status, and the hospital holds Joint Commission certifications in advanced comprehensive stroke care, hip joint replacement, knee joint replacement and spine surgery. The medical center is home to Central Florida’s only air ambulance service, the Air Care Team, which was founded in 1985 and has flown more than 19,000 patients and 1.2 million accident-free miles across a 90-mile, 10-county service radius. Orlando Health has more “Beacon Awards for Excellence” in bedside care than any other health system in Florida, and Orlando Regional Medical Center’s 13 active awards make it the hospital with the most “Beacon Award”units in the state. One of Florida’s six major teaching hospitals, the hospital offers seven residency programs and 10 fellowship programs accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, training medical students from universities including Florida State University, the University of Florida and the University of South Florida.
Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey (Pa.) Medical Center. Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center is a 628-bed flagship academic medical center, and the only locally based academic medical center in central Pennsylvania. The medical center was first ideated in 1963. The M.S. Hershey Foundation contributed a $50 million gift and the U.S. Public Health Service added $21.3 million to build Penn State College of Medicine and the medical center, which opened in 1970. Hershey Medical Center is home to the region’s only nationally verified level 1 trauma center for both children and adults, and shares its campus with the Penn State Cancer Institute, Penn State College of Medicine and Penn State Health Golisano Children’s Hospital, the most comprehensive children’s hospital between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. The medical center has a long history of innovation in artificial heart technology, dating back to the 1970s, when researchers created the Penn State heart-assist pump, used as a bridge to cardiac transplantation. In partnership with Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey Medical Center faculty continue to advance research in artificial organs, diagnostics, cancer treatments and the fundamental causes of disease. Hershey Medical Center has also been named to Newsweek‘s World’s Best Hospitals list for 2026.
Phoenix Children’s. U.S. News & World Report has ranked Phoenix Children’s among the nation’s “Best Children’s Hospitals” for 15 consecutive years, naming it the No. 1 children’s hospital in Arizona and third in the Southwest region. It is the only children’s hospital in Arizona ever recognized by the publication. The hospital is anchored by its Thomas Campus, which serves as the primary hub for the broader system’s most advanced pediatric medical care, clinical research and specialized treatments. With 920 employed and contracted physicians and advanced practice providers caring for more than 280,000 unique patients last year, Phoenix Children’s has continued expanding its footprint. Recently, the organization opened a 175,000-square-foot hospital and 45,000-square-foot specialty clinic in Glendale, Ariz., an emergency department in Avondale, Ariz., and a 44,000-square-foot level 4 neonatal intensive care unit in Phoenix, with a third pediatric hospital planned for the East Valley. Through its “WATCHER” digital surveillance program, which uses predictive algorithms and EHRs to flag hospitalized children at risk of deterioration, Phoenix Children’s has identified more than 400 children needing a higher level of care. The Phoenix Children’s Research Institute, based at the University of Arizona College of Medicine–Phoenix, now includes more than 700 active studies, 640 research investigators and 90 research staff. In 2025, it received more than $2.2 million in extramural research support, alongside more than $10.5 million in sponsored research funding for Phoenix Children’s overall. Phoenix Children’s also partnered with Amazon to add video-enabled telehealth, virtual interpretation and behavioral health access across 750 clinic rooms and emergency departments.
Presbyterian Hospital (Albuquerque, N.M.). Presbyterian Hospital, a nonprofit facility in the heart of Albuquerque, serves as the flagship hospital of the Presbyterian health system and offers specialized care in heart health, women’s health, children’s health and neuroscience. The hospital recently opened an 11-story patient care tower to expand access to care. Once remodels to existing buildings are complete, Presbyterian Hospital will have a 600-private-room capacity, the largest in New Mexico. Presbyterian Hospital is ranked No. 1 in Albuquerque and No. 2 in New Mexico overall in U.S. News & World Report‘s Best Hospitals rankings. The hospital also performs strongly in specialty areas such as cardiology and heart surgery. Presbyterian Hospital was the only hospital in New Mexico to earn the American College of Cardiology’s “NCDR Chest Pain – MI Registry Platinum Performance Achievement Award” for 2025, celebrating success in implementing a higher standard of care for heart attack patients.
Providence Alaska Medical Center (Anchorage). Providence Alaska Medical Center is the state’s largest hospital and a nationally recognized adult and pediatric trauma center, providing full-service, comprehensive care to Alaskans across the state. Providence’s roots in Alaska date back to 1902, when the Sisters of Providence first established healthcare there during the Gold Rush. Today, Providence serves Alaskans in six communities: Anchorage, Eagle River, Kodiak Island, Mat-Su, Seward and Valdez. Providence Alaska is the state’s largest private employer, with more than 4,000 full- and part-time employees working across the organization statewide. The hospital’s strategic plan publicly commits to patient safety as a core value, including a goal of “zero preventable harm.” Providence Alaska Medical Center recently became the first in the state to offer a breakthrough treatment for a complex group of cancers that can develop in the pancreas, stomach, intestines, and other parts of the digestive system. In addition, it achieved accreditation from the Surgical Review Corporation as a center of excellence in robotic surgery. U.S. News & World Report ranked Providence Alaska Medical Center No. 1 in Alaska for 2026-27.
Providence St. Patrick Hospital (Missoula, Mont.). Providence St. Patrick Hospital is a 237-bed, nonprofit medical center founded in 1873. The hospital serves as the region’s only level 2 trauma center and acts as a major healthcare hub for western Montana, providing general medical and surgical services to the Missoula County community. Providence St. Patrick Hospital is a “Best Regional Hospital” and is ranked No. 1 in Montana according to U.S. News & World Report‘s 2026-27 rankings. This marks the seventh year in a row that the hospital was rated as first-in-state. The hospital is rated high performing in 16 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve surgery, back surgery, colon cancer surgery and ear, nose and throat surgery. In addition, the hospital has received CMS 5-star ratings for 10 consecutive years.
Queen’s Medical Center (Honolulu). The Queen’s Medical Center was founded in 1859 and was originally known as Queen’s Hospital. With 575 acute care beds, it is the largest private, nonprofit hospital in Honolulu and has been on the cutting edge of healthcare advancements for more than 160 years. One of four hospitals in The Queen’s Health Systems, The Queen’s Medical Center serves as the major referral center for cancer, heart disease, neuroscience, orthopedics, surgery, emergency medicine and behavioral health. The medical center is home to the only organ transplant program in the state of Hawai’i and is the state’s first and only level 1 trauma center. The Queen’s Medical Center is also a major teaching hospital for the University of Hawai’i John A. Burns School of Medicine, serving as one of its largest clinical sites for medical students. In August 2026, the The Queen’s Medical Center’s emergency department was a recipient of the 2026 Emergency Nurses Association “Lantern Award,” the first and only hospital in Hawai‘i to do so.
Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego. The West Coast’s largest children’s hospital, Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego serves over 280,000 children each year. With nearly 1,000 physicians, 1,500 nurses and 6,000 employees, it is consistently ranked among the nation’s leading children’s hospitals, appearing on U.S. News & World Report‘s honor roll and earning national recognition in all 11 pediatric specialties. Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine pioneers personalized gene therapies for rare diseases, such as treatments targeting neurodevelopmental SCN2A-related disorders that help patients achieve life-changing outcomes. Its leading-edge 3D innovations lab creates sophisticated anatomical models and virtual reality visualizations from medical imaging, helping clinicians plan complex procedures with greater precision. A national leader in pediatric behavioral health, it integrates mental health services into primary care settings, enabling early identification and treatment while significantly reducing anxiety and depression symptoms among participating patients. Among many firsts, Rady Children’s performed the first genetic therapy treatment for hearing loss on the West Coast, has the West’s largest clinical volume for fetal cardiac MRI, and the state’s only pediatric skilled nursing facility. As the pediatric teaching partner of UC San Diego School of Medicine, Rady Children’s trains the next generation of pediatric specialists and supports over 800 active research studies and clinical trials with research institutions worldwide. In 2025, parent companies of Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego and Children’s Hospital of Orange County merged to create Rady Children’s Health, becoming one of the largest pediatric health systems.
Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center (Buffalo, N.Y.). Rated “exceptional” by the National Cancer Institute, Roswell Park is the only NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center in Upstate New York and a national leader in cancer research, treatment, screening and prevention. The organization is consistently recognized among the nation’s leading cancer centers and continues to advance molecular diagnostics, immunotherapies and cellular therapies that improve outcomes for patients with complex cancers. Additional distinctions include Magnet recognition for nursing excellence, Optum centers of excellence designations for adult and pediatric cancer care and stem cell transplantation, and accreditation through multiple American College of Surgeons/Commission on Cancer quality programs. Since its founding in 1898 as the first center dedicated to cancer research, Roswell Park has generated numerous landmark discoveries and innovations, including the PSA prostate cancer test, pioneering advances in cancer chemotherapy and SurVaxM, a novel immunotherapy currently in late-stage clinical development as a treatment for glioblastoma brain tumors. Home to New York State’s first and largest cell therapy hub, a portfolio of more than 400 active clinical trials and an award-winning community outreach and engagement program, Roswell Park serves as a national destination for complex cancer care and services.
Rush University Medical Center (Chicago). For the seventh straight year, Rush University Medical Center is on U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Hospitals” honor roll for 2026-27, ranking No. 7 in the U.S. for neurology and neurosurgery and No. 9 for orthopedics. The medical center also ranked among the top 50 nationally in cancer, cardiology, diabetes and endocrinology, gastroenterology and GI surgery, geriatrics, gynecology, and pulmonology and lung surgery. The academic medical center includes a 671-bed hospital serving adults and children, the 61-bed Johnston R. Bowman Health Center and Rush University, and for more than 180 years has helped develop innovative, often life-saving treatments. The medical center is a thriving center for basic and clinical research, with physicians and scientists involved in hundreds of research projects testing the effectiveness and safety of new therapies and medical devices. The medical center also offers more than 70 highly selective residency and fellowship programs across medical and surgical specialties and subspecialties. Rush maintains a strong commitment to its community through initiatives such as the “Rush Community Services Initiatives Program,” an umbrella for student-led outreach efforts addressing the social and health care needs of neighboring Chicago communities.
Sanford Medical Center Bismarck (N.D.). Sanford Medical Center Bismarck is a general medical and surgical hospital serving the Burleigh County community. According to U.S. News & World Report, it is a “Best Regional Hospital,” ranked No. 1 in North Dakota and recognized in the Great Plains region, and is nationally ranked in one adult specialty and rated high performing in 12 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, back surgery, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, colon cancer surgery and heart arrhythmia. The hospital offers traditional, minimally invasive and robotic surgery across specialties including brain and spine, heart, orthopedic, pediatric, transplant, trauma and vascular surgery. As a level 2 trauma and stroke center accredited by the American College of Surgeons, Sanford Medical Center Bismarck provides advanced 24-hour care to patients with life-threatening conditions. The hospital’s birth center offers modernized labor and delivery rooms, and its neonatal ICU provides private rooms so families can stay with their newborns. Sanford Medical Center Bismarck is a Magnet-designated facility for nursing excellence and participates in the “Increasing Organ Transplant Access” model.
Sanford Medical Center Fargo (N.D.). Sanford Medical Center Fargo, North Dakota’s largest hospital and a 705-bed tertiary and quaternary referral center, was named to the inaugural Forbes “Top Hospitals” list in 2026 and recognized as a 5-star facility, placing it among the top 5% of hospitals nationwide. The medical center remains North Dakota’s only level 1 adult trauma center and level 2 pediatric trauma center, having been re-verified by the American College of Surgeons in 2025 after caring for 2,859 adult and pediatric trauma patients that year. The hospital launched a whole blood program through Sanford Ambulance, the only nationally accredited ambulance agency in the state, allowing critically injured patients to begin receiving blood transfusions before reaching the hospital. In April 2025, the medical center earned its first American Nurses’ Credentialing Center Magnet designation, becoming one of only two Magnet hospitals in North Dakota and earning five exemplars for exceeding national nursing standards. In December 2024, the medical center became the first hospital in North Dakota to launch a hospital-at-home program. Since 2021, Sanford Fargo’s blood and bone marrow transplant program has completed more than 175 transplants, including CAR-T and tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte therapies. Meanwhile, the hospital’s 14 residency and fellowship programs with the University of North Dakota expanded in 2026 to include new cardiovascular disease and surgical critical care fellowships.
Sanford USD Medical Center (Sioux Falls, S.D). Sanford USD Medical Center is the largest hospital in South Dakota and serves as a teaching hospital for the University of South Dakota Sanford School of Medicine. The medical center offers comprehensive care, including emergency air transport, neonatal and pediatric intensive care, transplant services, and specialty centers in children’s care, heart, cancer, neuroscience, sports medicine and women’s health. With 545 beds and 4,000 employees, Sanford USD Medical Center is the only level 1 adult and level 2 pediatric trauma center in South Dakota verified by the American College of Surgeons. The hospital participates in the “Increasing Organ Transplant Access” model and has been a Magnet-recognized organization for nursing excellence since 2003, earning the designation five consecutive times. U.S. News & World Report ranked Sanford USD Medical Center the No. 1 hospital in South Dakota in its 2026-2027 “Best Regional Hospitals” rankings, recognizing it as a top-performing general medical and surgical facility. Sanford Health is adding a new clinic space on the Sanford USD Medical Center campus to provide dermatology and plastic surgery services, with the work expected to complete at the end of 2027.
Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla (Calif.). Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla is a level 1 trauma center anchored by the Barbey Family Emergency and Trauma Center, sharing its campus with the Prebys Cardiovascular Institute and Scripps Clinic’s John R. Anderson V Medical Pavilion. The hospital offers specialty programs in cancer care, heart surgery, orthopedic surgery, and labor and delivery services, including a level 3 neonatal ICU and a nationally designated comprehensive stroke center. In June 2025, Scripps Health opened the hospital’s new North Tower, a $664 million, eight-floor inpatient building with comprehensive mother-baby services, advanced-technology operating rooms and private patient rooms. The North Tower added 188 inpatient beds, bringing Scripps La Jolla’s licensed bed count up to 495 from 426 previously, plus another 36 neonatal ICU beds licensed to Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego. About 3,200 babies are delivered at Scripps La Jolla each year. U.S. News & World Report ranked Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla No. 9 in California and No. 2 in San Diego for 2026-27, and the hospital also appears on Newsweek‘s list of World’s Best Hospitals for 2026.
Seattle Children’s Hospital. For more than 100 years, Seattle Children’s Hospital has specialized in meeting the physical, emotional and developmental needs of children from infancy through young adulthood. Physicians across nearly 60 pediatric subspecialties provide inpatient, outpatient, diagnostic, surgical, rehabilitative, behavioral, emergency and outreach services, regardless of a family’s ability to pay. The hospital’s research division, made up of Seattle Children’s Research Institute and Seattle Children’s Therapeutics, is internationally recognized for its work in cancer therapies, genetics, neuroscience, immunology, infectious disease and bioethics. In 2026-27, U.S. News & World Report again named Seattle Children’s among the top 10 best children’s hospitals in the U.S. and the best in the Pacific Northwest, a distinction it has held every year since the publication began ranking medical centers more than 30 years ago. In 2025, the hospital recorded 600,680 patient visits, performed 19,002 outpatient surgeries and 6,311 inpatient surgeries, and operated 423 total licensed beds. That same year, Seattle Children’s Research Institute reported $235.5 million in total extramural funding, including $123.1 million from the federal government and $16.1 million from corporations.
St. Elizabeth Healthcare Edgewood (Ky.)-Covington Hospitals. St. Elizabeth Healthcare Edgewood-Covington Hospitals is a general medical and surgical hospital serving the Kenton County community in Northern Kentucky. In its 2026-27 Best Regional Hospitals rankings, U.S. News & World Report named the hospital Kentucky’s No. 1 hospital for the second consecutive year and Greater Cincinnati’s No. 1 hospital for the first time. St. Elizabeth is rated “high-performing” in categories including heart failure, stroke, lung cancer surgery, joint replacement, advanced cardiac procedures, abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve surgery, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, colon cancer surgery and diabetes. Established in 1861, the hospital’s parent system, St. Elizabeth, was founded to serve the healthcare needs of its community. Today, it operates as a nationally acclaimed health system caring for thousands of patients each year via six facilities and more than 172 primary care and specialty practices across Northern Kentucky, Southeastern Indiana and the Greater Cincinnati region. Sponsored by the Diocese of Covington, St. Elizabeth is a mission-based organization that provides more than $100 million in uncompensated care and community benefits each year.
St. Francis Hospital-Tulsa (Okla.). Saint Francis Hospital is a 1,112-bed tertiary center that serves as the flagship of Saint Francis Health System. The hospital offers one of the region’s most comprehensive arrays of advanced clinical services, including a level 1 trauma center, comprehensive cancer care, neurosciences, neonatology, orthopedics, interventional pulmonology, robotic surgery and histotripsy. These programs are supported by nationally recognized physicians across more than 20 specialties. Its services include a comprehensive stroke center, a joint replacement and spine center, cardiovascular surgery, and a labor and delivery program through its expectant family program. According to the 2026-27 U.S. News & World Report rankings, Saint Francis Hospital is a “Best Regional Hospital,” ranked No. 1 in Oklahoma for the 10th consecutive year and No. 1 in Tulsa. The hospital is rated high performing in 15 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, heart attack and heart bypass surgery. Saint Francis Hospital has earned level 1 trauma center verification from the American College of Surgeons, the highest designation available for trauma care. Through a public-private partnership with the OSU Medical Authority, created and funded by the Oklahoma Legislature, Saint Francis contributes to the education of future physicians, ensuring the trauma program’s sustainability well into the future. As the only hospital in the region with pediatric specialties, including a pediatric emergency center, Saint Francis offers advanced trauma care for both adults and children.
St. Luke’s Boise (Idaho) Medical Center. St. Luke’s Boise Medical Center is a 437-bed regional acute care hospital founded in 1902 and now serving as the flagship facility of St. Luke’s Health System. The medical center has served the region for more than 120 years, and is nationally recognized for quality and patient safety, including a Magnet designation, the gold standard for nursing care. The medical center offers 24/7 emergency care, advanced inpatient and outpatient surgery, mother-baby services, diagnostics ranging from X-ray to MRI, state-of-the-art cancer treatment and critical care. Its campus also includes a range of primary and specialty physician clinics and St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital, the only children’s hospital in Idaho. U.S. News & World Report ranked St. Luke’s Boise Medical Center No. 1 in Boise and rated it high performing in rehabilitation for 2026-2027. The hospital is in the midst of The Boise Campus Development project, which includes a new nine-story hospital tower with a helipad, connected to a six-story medical office plaza, which will then connect to a parking garage. The project will provide 80 additional hospital beds, relocate all Boise-based surgical services and add seven additional operating rooms for a total of 27. The initiative aims to support growing patient needs and expand services, and will also feature unfinished spaces that can be built out into the future.
Stanford Hospital (Palo Alto, Calif.). Stanford Hospital, part of Stanford Health Care and the broader Stanford Medicine system, is a general medical and surgical hospital serving the Santa Clara County community. The hospital has been verified as a level 1 trauma center by the American College of Surgeons since 1998, confirming its ability to provide comprehensive, round-the-clock care for patients with the most serious trauma injuries, and it is the only hospital between San Francisco and San Jose to hold that designation. Stanford Hospital is on U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Hospitals” honor roll and is nationally ranked in 11 adult specialties. The hospital is also rated high performing in 19 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve surgery, colon cancer surgery, ear, nose and throat surgery, and gynecological cancer surgery. Stanford Hospital is a “Best Regional Hospital,” ranked No. 1 in California and No. 1 in San Jose. Beyond the hospital itself, Stanford Health Care operates primary care offices throughout the Bay Area, outpatient clinics in Redwood City and Palo Alto, and the Stanford South Bay Cancer Center. Stanford Hospital has been designated one of the “World’s Best Smart Hospitals” by Newsweek for 2026, having been built as an Internet of things hospital designed to accommodate advanced patient-centric technology like digital applications, tracking sensors on medical equipment, autonomous robots and patient-controlled room tech.
Tampa (Fla.) General Hospital. Tampa General Hospital, which functions as the primary teaching affiliate of USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, is the Tampa Bay region’s only level 1 trauma center and comprehensive burn center, and serves as the designated safety-net hospital for 23 counties across West Central Florida. U.S. News & World Report has ranked Tampa General Hospital as the top hospital in the Tampa Bay region for 11 consecutive years, with five specialties in the national top 50 in its 2026-2027 rankings. Meanwhile, it was named the top hospital in Tampa Bay and a top-three hospital in Florida among Newsweek’s “World’s Best Hospitals” for 2026, designating it an “8-Year Champion & All-Time Winner.” The hospital’s transplant program ranks among the top five centers nationally for adult solid organ transplant volume and surpassed 15,000 total transplants in 2026. The hospital is the only academic health system in the U.S. to hold two safety qualifications from DNV and holds its fifth consecutive Magnet designation, a distinction held by fewer than 2% of hospitals nationally. The hospital’s AI-powered care coordination center, developed with Palantir Technologies, has driven an 83% reduction in patient placement time, a 28% decrease in post-anesthesia care unit holds and a 30% reduction in sepsis patient length of stay. The $550 million Taneja Surgical, Neuroscience & Transplant Tower, set to open in 2028, will add 144 beds and 32 operating suites across 563,000 square feet to consolidate surgical, neuroscience and transplant services. Tampa General Hospital’s Muma Children’s Hospital was one of only 10 health systems nationally and the only one in Florida to be recognized in Vizient’s 2025 pediatric quality leadership ranking.
Texas Children’s Hospital (Houston). As the academic partner and principal teaching site for Baylor College of Medicine, Texas Children’s is a global leader in pediatric education, training and innovation. With over $179 million in annual external research funding, 800,000-plus square feet of laboratory space, 90 newly discovered disease genes and over 400 active clinical trials, Texas Children’s drives breakthrough discoveries shaping the future of pediatric medicine. Its research enterprise is at the forefront of addressing neurological diseases, rare disorders and other high-impact conditions, where a single diagnosis can change outcomes for countless children. Texas Children’s and Houston-based University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center announced plans last year to integrate their pediatric cancer programs as Kinder Children’s Cancer Center, a landmark collaboration fueled by a transformational $150 million gift from Kinder Foundation and united around a singular mission of ending childhood cancer. This year, Texas Children’s completed a $200 million expansion of its Pavilion for Women, significantly increasing capacity for highly specialized maternal, fetal and neonatal care. It consistently ranks among the best pediatric hospitals by U.S. News & World Report, with all 10 ranked pediatric specialties among the nation’s top 10. Cardiology and heart surgery, neurology and neurosurgery, and pulmonology and lung surgery all rank No. 1 nationally, reflecting the depth of expertise and highly specialized care provided to patients from across the country and around the world.
Thomas Jefferson University Hospital (Philadelphia). An 874-bed academic medical center founded in 1824, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital is the flagship hospital of Jefferson Health’s 33-hospital system, one of the top 15 nonprofit academic health systems in the U.S. It is also home to the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, a National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center, and a level 1 trauma center. The hospital is listed among the top two best hospitals in the Philadelphia region by U.S. News & World Report, with multiple nationally ranked programs, including orthopedics, ophthalmology, and neurology and neurosurgery. The hospital continuously advances clinical breakthroughs and innovation in patient care, as evidenced by the hospital’s recent completion of the nation’s first living donor resection and partial liver transplantation with delayed total hepatectomy, expanding treatment options for patients with advanced colorectal cancer that has spread to the liver. Among Jefferson’s many innovations is the same day/next day cancer care program, which since its inception in the summer of 2024 has already connected more than 2,000 patients with oncology specialists within 24 to 48 hours of a new or suspected cancer diagnosis. As the clinical centerpiece of Thomas Jefferson University, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital is directly supported by more than $84 million in active National Institutes of Health funding and more than 178 federal research awards, reflecting its strength as a leading clinical, academic and research institution.
Tufts Medical Center (Boston). Tufts Medical Center is an academic medical center that has provided care across New England for more than two centuries and serves as the principal teaching hospital for Tufts University School of Medicine. The medical center offers more than 100 specialties and services, including heart care, cancer treatment, neuroscience, orthopedics and organ transplantation, and its emergency services include a level 1 trauma center, a heliport and geriatric emergency care accreditation. Since 2000, Tufts Medical Center has performed more adult heart transplants than any other center in New England. In Boston Magazine‘s latest “Top Doctors” issue, 160 Tufts Medical Center physicians were recognized across 47 clinical specialties. The medical center has received Magnet recognition from the American Nurses Credentialing Center, the most prestigious credential a health care organization can receive for nursing excellence. Tufts Medical Center recently received a $92 million grant to support the Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute, which funds research and trains the next generation of researchers.
UAB Hospital (Birmingham, Ala.). For 11 consecutive years, UAB Hospital has been ranked the best hospital in Alabama by U.S. News & World Report. The hospital recently expanded to 1,400 licensed beds while maintaining a case mix index among the top four for comparable academic medical centers. UAB Hospital is home to one of the nation’s most active organ transplant centers, performing more than 400 heart, lung, liver, kidney, pancreas, uterus and multi-organ transplants annually, including transplants across blood types and HIV-positive to HIV-positive procedures. Its emergency department was the first in the nation to earn level 1 accreditation from the American College of Emergency Physicians, and the hospital’s discharge lounge has served more than 35,000 patients while saving more than 16,000 bed hours. UAB reduced hospital-acquired pressure injuries by 53% and pressure ulcers by 75%, and its enhanced lay navigation program cut unnecessary emergency department visits by more than 40% and inpatient utilization by more than 60%. UAB Hospital holds its sixth Magnet designation for nursing excellence and is nationally ranked by U.S. News & World Report in rheumatology, ear, nose and throat, obstetrics and gynecology, and neurology and neurosurgery. Recent expansions include a new UAB Rehabilitation Pavilion for inpatient rehabilitation, a more-than-66,000-square-foot expansion of the University Emergency Department adding 59 exam rooms, and the extension of structural heart and cardiovascular services to UAB Medical West, where nearly 800 interventional heart cases have been completed. The broader UAB Health System, for which UAB Hospital is the flagship, is also preparing to roll out the Epic EHR systemwide within the next year to unify patient records and streamline care across its locations.
UC Davis Medical Center (Sacramento, Calif.). UC Davis Medical Center is a 656-bed academic medical center recognized as Sacramento’s top hospital for 15 consecutive years and consistently ranked among the top 10 in California by U.S. News & World Report, with multiple nationally ranked specialty areas of care. As the region’s only combined level 1 adult and pediatric trauma center, the medical center manages more than one million patient visits annually, supported by one of the nation’s leading neurology and neurosurgery programs. UC Davis is nationally distinguished for Alzheimer’s and autism research, speech-restoring brain–computer interfaces, and transformative innovations such as the first-ever stem cell therapy for spina bifida delivered during fetal surgery and genetic therapies for rare diseases. Recent advances also include FDA-approved pre-symptomatic Alzheimer’s testing, augmented-reality–guided surgery, genetic treatments for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and pioneering thoracoabdominal branch endoprosthesis procedures for complex aortic aneurysms. The medical center’s research enterprise drives breakthroughs across cancer biology, arrhythmia modeling, immunology and cardiovascular health, supported by National Institutes of Health-funded centers such as its National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center and the internationally renowned UC Davis MIND Institute. UC Davis Medical Center has earned numerous honors, including Magnet designation, Baby-Friendly Hospital status, multiple “Best Places to Work” awards from Forbes and others, and Newsweek rankings for best maternity and best children’s hospitals.
UC San Diego Health–La Jolla (Calif.) and Hillcrest (Calif) Medical Centers. UC San Diego Health is the region’s only academic medical center, having served the San Diego community for more than half a century across a growing network that includes flagship campuses Hillcrest Medical Center and Jacobs Medical Center. The system’s Hillcrest campus operates a level 1 trauma center, regional burn center and comprehensive stroke center, and is staffed by approximately 5,000 nurses, doctors, technicians and administrators who care for all patients, including those who are uninsured or underinsured. Jacobs Medical Center, a 364-bed, 10-story facility that opened in 2016, includes 10 operating rooms, a dedicated blood and marrow transplant floor, and a birth center with a level 3 neonatal ICU. In addition, a Thornton MRI Expansion project at the campus began in August 2026 and is expected to be complete in fall 2027. The system’s East Campus Medical Center became UC San Diego Health’s third hospital two years ago, and its average daily census has since doubled, with more than 4,000 patients transferring there in the past two years, primarily from the flagship Jacobs and Hillcrest medical centers. UC San Diego Health’s hospitals appear on U.S. News & World Report’s 2026-27 “Best Hospitals” honor roll, ranked No. 1 in California and No. 1 in San Diego for the seventh consecutive year, and nationally ranked in eight adult specialties, including pulmonology and lung surgery at No. 7, obstetrics and gynecology at No. 8, and cardiology, heart and vascular surgery at No. 15. It is also rated “high-performing” in two adult specialties and in 23 procedures and conditions, ranking among the top 20 hospital systems in the nation.
UCI Health–Orange (Calif.). UCI Health–Orange is UCI Health’s flagship location, rated among the nation’s top 10 academic medical centers for high-quality care and among the best hospitals by U.S. News & World Report. It is home to Orange County’s only level 1 adult and level 2 pediatric trauma center, National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center, and regional burn center. The medical center’s Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center is the only 57 NCI-designated comprehensive cancer centers based in Orange County. It was the county’s first hospital to receive Magnet recognition for nursing excellence and is among an elite group of institutions worldwide designated five times. The University of California Regents purchased Orange County Medical Center and renamed it UCI Medical Center in 1976, and the medical center has since been renamed UCI Health–Orange and become the region’s leading provider of tertiary and quaternary care. UCI Health’s comprehensive stroke and cerebrovascular center was the first stroke center in the county certified by The Joint Commission, and its cardiology services program includes the first heart failure program in Southern California to earn the Joint Commission’s “Gold Seal of Approval.” UCI Health’s stem cell transplant and cellular therapy services program is the first and only adult hematopoietic stem cell and bone marrow transplant program in Orange County, and its outpatient care network ranks among the top five ambulatory systems nationwide.
UCLA Medical Center (Los Angeles). Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center has delivered care since its founding in 1955 and reopened in 2008 as a 10-story, 520-bed facility purposefully designed around patient-centered care and clinical excellence. As a level 1 trauma center, the flagship facility for UCLA Health handles more than 50,000 emergency department visits annually, supported by a staff of tens of thousands, including thousands of registered nurses. Every patient room is engineered to convert into an ICU, and clinicians operate in fully integrated, paperless operating rooms featuring voice-activated controls, advanced imaging and enhanced-vision lighting. The hospital has been consistently ranked among the nation’s top hospitals by U.S. News & World Report for more than three decades, with recognized excellence in trauma care, organ transplantation and nursing leadership. In 2026, Newsweek named the medical center among its “World’s Best Hospitals,” “World’s Best Specialized Hospitals,” “World’s Best Smart Hospitals,” “America’s Best-in-State Hospitals” and “America’s Best Maternity Hospitals.” The medical center houses specialized floors dedicated to UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital and the Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA, and operates as a research and teaching hub integrated with the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, giving patients access to novel therapies and advanced clinical trials.
UCSF Medical Center (San Francisco). UCSF Medical Center, part of UCSF Health and affiliated with the UCSF School of Medicine, is a 600-bed academic medical center made up of three campuses that serve as San Francisco’s academic hub for tertiary and quaternary care. Its roots trace to 1864, when the UCSF School of Medicine was founded; the school became part of the University of California in 1873 and opened its first UC hospital at the Parnassus Heights campus in 1907. UCSF Medical Center has been named to U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Hospitals” honor roll for adult care for the 30th consecutive year, and in the 2026-2027 rankings it tied as the highest-ranked hospital in California and was named the best hospital in the San Francisco metropolitan area. The medical center ranked among the nation’s top 10 hospitals in 10 specialties, more than any other hospital in California, and was ranked best in the nation in geriatrics and in pulmonology and lung surgery. The medical center also ranked No. 1 in California in six specialties, including neurology and neurosurgery, rheumatology, urology, and diabetes and endocrinology. UCSF Medical Center received “high-performing” ratings in 22 of 23 adult procedures and conditions evaluated. UCSF Mission Bay, which opened in 2015, expanded care to children, women and cancer patients, while the Mount Zion campus, about a mile north of the main campus, is home to the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center and serves as a major ambulatory training site.
UT Southwestern Medical Center (Dallas). According to U.S. News & World Report‘s 2026-27 rankings, UT Southwestern Medical Center is the No. 1 hospital in Dallas-Fort Worth for the 10th consecutive year and ranks among the top hospitals for care in 11 national specialties, the most of any hospital in Texas. For more than 75 years, the academic medical center has trained physicians, medical scientists and health care professionals while advancing medical research and patient care in North Texas. UT Southwestern’s faculty has received six Nobel Prizes since 1985 and currently includes 28 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 26 members of the National Academy of Medicine and 14 Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigators. The medical center’s faculty of more than 3,400 conducts research ranging from the microscopic level to whole-patient care, contributing to medical advances and new treatment options. UT Southwestern is the official health care partner to the Dallas Mavericks, FC Dallas, Dallas Trinity FC, National Cricket League, PGA Frisco and Southern Methodist University Athletics. Recent news includes the April 2026 launch of the North Texas Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, a collaboration with UT Dallas and UT Arlington, aimed at advancing the national Alzheimer’s disease research agenda. UT Southwestern Medical Center also ranked No. 1 in the world for healthcare research by Nature Index in 2026.
UVA Health University Medical Center (Charlottesville, Va.). UVA Health University Medical Center, a 696-bed academic medical center, is home to Virginia’s first National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center, the state’s only comprehensive transplant center for adults and children, the region’s level 1 trauma center and a level 4 neonatal ICU. The medical center is listed No. 1 for Virginia hospitals by Newsweek for two straight years and is nationally ranked among the best specialized hospitals for orthopedics, neurology, cardiology and cancer care. U.S. News & World Report ranks its children’s hospital No. 1 in Virginia, with national rankings in nine pediatric specialties. For adult care, the publication named the medical center as “high-performing” for 15 procedures and conditions, as well regional rankings as among the top three in Virginia for cancer, rehabilitation and orthopedics. The medical center also recently earned a 4-star CMS rating. UVA Health recently launched Virginia’s first dedicated robotic cardiac surgery program featuring the cutting-edge da Vinci 5 system, advanced MRI-guided cardiac ablations, and major clinical trials using focused ultrasound to improve drug delivery for glioblastoma. The health system also launched “virtual primary care on demand,” enabling adult and pediatric patients five and older across the Commonwealth to connect online with a primary care provider from anywhere. It expanded access to care by opening the enhanced UVA Medical Park Zion Crossroads (Va.), adding an estimated 50,000 appointment slots annually for primary and specialty care patients. Looking ahead, UVA Health Children’s plans to add 40 beds to its neonatal ICU to ensure critically ill newborns across Virginia receive highly specialized care close to home.
UW Health University Hospital (Madison, Wis.). UW Health University Hospital has been ranked the No. 1 hospital in Wisconsin by U.S. News & World Report for 15 consecutive years. The hospital is home to the state’s only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center, UW Carbone Cancer Center, along with one of Wisconsin’s only level 1 pediatric trauma centers. The hospital had nine medical and surgical specialties ranked among the nation’s top 50, including diabetes and endocrinology at No. 10 and obstetrics and gynecology at No. 12. Newsweek‘s 2026 “World’s Best Hospitals” list ranked the hospital’s parent system UW Health as 31st in the U.S. and 205th in the world, and named it a world leader in infection prevention. Meanwhile, UW Health University Hospital was ranked No. 1 in Wisconsin on Newsweek‘s “Best in State Hospitals” list. The system’s recent accomplishments include the 2024 opening of UW Health Eastpark Medical Center, one of the largest U.S. healthcare facilities completed that year, and the start of construction on the University Row Medical Center in Madison. UW Health also recently completed its 1,000th lung transplant, leading the state in transplant activity, and launched the country’s first surgical technology apprenticeship degree program along with a new MRI technologist apprenticeship to address workforce shortages. The health system is participating in the PRISM trial studying AI in mammography screening and has found that ambient AI tools are improving clinician wellbeing. UW Health facilities continue to earn Magnet recognition for nursing excellence, and the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health achieved a “tier 1” national ranking for primary care education in the U.S. News & World Report “Best Medical Schools” list for 2026.
UMass Memorial Medical Center (Worcester, Mass.). UMass Memorial Medical Center is a nonprofit academic medical center with 905 licensed beds and a children’s hospital, serving as the clinical partner of UMass Chan Medical School. It operates the sole level 1 trauma center in Central and Western Massachusetts, and its emergency and trauma center is home to Life Flight, New England’s first hospital-based air ambulance and the only emergency helicopter service in Central Massachusetts, with more than 40,000 patient flights to date. The medical center serves as the region’s transplantation hub for liver, kidney, pancreas and bone marrow procedures, and its newborn ICU has earned international recognition. Its children’s hospital, the only one in Central Massachusetts, fields more than 200 medical and surgical experts across more than 30 specialties and houses the region’s only pediatric ICU and pediatric AIDS treatment facility. In 2025, UMass Memorial became the first level 1 trauma center in the U.S. to deploy “KATE,” an AI triage support system, expanding the technology across seven emergency departments systemwide, and researchers from UMass Chan Medical School and the medical center conducted the first U.S. study using the Mirai AI tool to prospectively predict breast cancer risk, screening 65,000 patients and flagging 4,000 high-risk individuals whose mammograms showed no suspicious signs. UMass Memorial was named to Newsweek‘s “World’s Best Hospitals” list for 2026.
University of Chicago Medical Center. The 811-bed academic medical center and anchor hospital for UChicago Medicine is the hub of a rapidly growing academic health system. It combines nationally recognized clinical care, leading-edge research and medical education with the University of Chicago’s biological sciences division and the Pritzker School of Medicine. The work of over 200 physicians and scientists at its comprehensive cancer center, which is one of just two in Illinois, will be accelerated by AbbVie Foundation Cancer Pavilion’s 575,000 square foot building. UChicago Medicine invests in Chicago’s South Side with new clinical laboratories and health-professions training facilities, strengthening connections of biomedical discovery, workforce development and patient care. Its 29 consecutive “A” hospital safety grades from The Leapfrog Group is achieved by only 11 hospitals nationally in every grading cycle since 2012, and the hospital has also earned its eighth “Top Teaching Hospital” designation. U.S. News & World Report‘s 2026-27 rankings placed it among the nation’s best in seven adult specialties, including No. 15 in cancer, No. 17 in obstetrics and gynecology, and No. 23 in gastroenterology and GI surgery. The medical center is affiliated with 12 Nobel Prize winners in physiology or medicine, and received $212.8 million in National Institutes of Health awards in fiscal year 2026. UChicago Medicine is the state’s first health system treating patients with histotripsy, a noninvasive procedure applying focused ultrasound waves to destroy liver tumors, and is among the first 30 in the U.S. offering tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte therapy for advanced melanoma. Cancer researchers partner with Argonne National Laboratory to use AI, machine learning and high-performance computing to accelerate discovery of therapies for drug-resistant cancer.
University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center. University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center is the flagship quaternary academic medical center of University Hospitals, which is one of the nation’s most funded research institutions, with $237 million in research funding and more than 3,500 clinical trials and studies underway. UH Cleveland Medical Center was named the No. 7 academic medical center in the U.S. and No. 15 in the world by Brand Finance for 2026, and U.S. News & World Report has included it on its “Best Hospitals” list for 28 consecutive years as of 2026-27. Its UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital ranks among the nation’s top 50 children’s hospitals in all 11 specialties, with seven in the top 25 and its neonatal care ranked 10th nationally. Meanwhile, the UH Seidman Cancer Center on the hospital’s main campus is part of the NCI-designated Case Comprehensive Cancer Center, one of only 57 such centers nationally. In December 2025, UH Cleveland Medical Center received its fifth consecutive Magnet designation, an achievement held by fewer than 2% of U.S. hospitals. In July 2025, the Society of Thoracic Surgeons awarded UH’s Harrington Heart & Vascular Institute its highest 3-star rating for coronary artery bypass grafting across five UH medical centers, placing the system in the top 20% of programs nationally for cardiac surgery quality. In April 2026, University Hospitals became the first health system in the U.S. to earn ISO 9001 certification at the corporate level, certifying every hospital and its headquarters. UH’s transplant program ranks 14th out of 257 adult kidney transplant programs and 16th out of 152 liver transplant programs nationally, with liver recipients achieving a 98% one-year survival rate. UH’s Neurological Institute recently became just the second in the nation to use NeuroOne’s OneRF system, performing 44 ablations over two days to treat a complex epilepsy case.
University of Iowa Health Care Medical Center (Iowa City). For 36 years, University of Iowa Health Care Medical Center has been ranked by U.S. News & World Report as Iowa’s top medical center. In addition, its Stead Family Children’s Hospital is the state’s only nationally ranked children’s hospital, placing No. 1 in Iowa and No. 11 in the Midwest. In its 2025 fiscal year, the parent system, UI Health Care, recorded more than 40,500 inpatient admissions, 1.5 million clinic visits, 41,600 major surgeries and 3,998 births across its three medical center campuses. As Iowa’s only comprehensive academic health system, UI Health Care operates more than 80 core research facilities, institutes and centers and ranks in the top 50 nationally for research by U.S. News & World Report. The hospital has cared for two of the most extreme premature-birth survivors on record, including the smallest surviving infant in the U.S. at 17 weeks and 240 grams, and the world’s most premature baby according to Guinness World Records, born at 21 weeks. The medical center campus houses the only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center in Iowa and, in 2024, joined forces with Mission Cancer + Blood to expand community-based oncology care across the state. Recent innovations at the health system include a 470,000-square-foot North Liberty campus that logged more than 142,300 outpatient orthopedic visits and 8,000 operating room cases in its first year, the first U.S. procedure using the ARCHIMEDES biodegradable pancreatic stent in fall 2025, and the state’s first robotic living donor nephrectomy in 2026.
University of Kansas Medical Center (Kansas City). The University of Kansas Hospital is an academic medical center and destination for complex care, becoming an independent hospital in 1998 as part of The University of Kansas Health System. U.S. News & World Report has consistently recognized the hospital as the No. 1 hospital in Kansas and in Kansas City, and it is the only hospital to receive these awards since their inception. Its cancer, cardiology, heart and vascular surgery, orthopedics and rehabilitation specialties are ranked No. 1 in Kansas and Kansas City, and five of its medical and surgical adult specialties rank among the top 50 nationwide. The hospital provides telehealth care for conditions including ALS, behavioral health and heart failure, and its physicians travel to partner sites throughout Kansas to deliver care closer to home. Through its Care Collaborative, the hospital’s teams share education and evidence-based protocols with peers in rural Kansas communities for time-critical diagnoses, including heart failure, sepsis, ST-elevation myocardial infarction, stroke and trauma. The University of Kansas Health System is the official health care provider for the Kansas City Chiefs, Kansas City Current, Kansas City Royals and T-Mobile Center, as well as University of Kansas Athletics alongside LMH Health. It also serves as the sports medicine and athletic training provider for more than 55 high schools and middle schools. In August 2026, the Kansas state senator, Colby, Kan.-based Citizens Health, The University of Kansas Health System and The University of Kansas Cancer Center together announced a new collaboration bringing a new state-of-the-art KU Cancer Center, made possible partially through the Rural Health Transformation Program.
University of Miami Hospital. University of Miami Hospital is the flagship hospital of UHealth-University of Miami Health System, South Florida’s only academic medical center and the clinical enterprise of the University of Miami, an Association of American Universities institution. The hospital includes over 700 licensed beds and is a hub for advanced specialty care across South Florida. University of Miami Hospital is recognized for clinical excellence, ranking in the top two in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale metropolitan area and among the top five hospitals in Florida in the 2026-27 U.S. News & World Report “Best Hospitals” rankings. The hospital has five nationally ranked adult specialties and 17 “high-performing” procedures and conditions in the same rankings. Bascom Palmer Eye Institute was named the nation’s No. 1 ophthalmology program for the 25th time, and Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, South Florida’s only National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center, was named the No. 1 cancer program in Florida. The organization achieved Magnet with distinction in 2025, becoming the first health system in Florida to earn the nursing designation. Through its broader UHealth network, which includes 40 outpatient locations, more than 100 medical specialties and approximately 1.7 million patient visits annually, the organization advances patient care. The system is supported by the research and education mission of the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, the No. 1 National Institutes of Health-funded medical school in Florida, with more than $178 million in NIH funding and over 1,700 active research projects. UHealth is also advancing innovation through more than 200 AI initiatives supporting clinical care, research and operations.
University of Michigan Health–University Hospital (Ann Arbor). University Hospital in Ann Arbor is the primary hospital for adult patients at University of Michigan Health, offering patients from across Michigan and beyond comprehensive inpatient and outpatient services including advanced diagnostics, surgical suites, intensive care and specialized treatment units. This 11-story, 1.8 million square-foot, 550-bed hospital is a central hub of the Michigan Medicine medical campus. University of Michigan Health–Ann Arbor ranks among the nation’s best and is the top hospital in Michigan, according to U.S. News & World Report‘s “Best Hospitals” rankings for 2026-2027. The hospital was the only one in the state named to the publication’s honor roll this year, and its Ann Arbor-area hospitals and health centers were nationally ranked in more specialties than any other Michigan hospital. It earned the national top 20 spot in four specialties, with ophthalmology at No. 8, rheumatology at No. 10, pulmonology and lung surgery at No. 16 and urology at No. 16. Additional specialties ranked among the nation’s best include cancer, cardiology, heart and vascular surgery, diabetes and endocrinology, gastroenterology and GI surgery, geriatrics, and neurology and neurosurgery. The hospital also secured an “A” Leapfrog hospital safety grade for spring 2026. Recent systemwide wins include the fall 2025 opening of the $920 million D. Dan and Betty Kahn Health Care Pavilion in Ann Arbor, expanding capacity and allowing the system to transfer adult inpatients from University Hospital and Frankel Cardiovascular Center.
The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (Houston). UT MD Anderson is a global leader in cancer care, research, prevention and education, ranked No. 1 in the nation for cancer care by U.S. News & World Report for the 12th year in a row. Over the past year, the institution saw historic milestones in its mission to end cancer. UT MD Anderson provided care for more than 197,000 patients, reached $7.8 billion in annual revenue, and led the world’s largest cancer clinical trials program, with 30 of 43 cancer drugs approved by the FDA last year investigated at UT MD Anderson. The institution announced a $150 million gift from Kinder Foundation to establish Kinder Children’s Cancer Center, a joint venture of UT MD Anderson and Texas Children’s, also in Houston, with a singular mission of ending childhood cancer. The institution also launched a $2.5 billion philanthropic campaign, “Only Possible Here, The Campaign to End Cancer.” This campaign, the largest in UT MD Anderson’s history, already raised $2.14 billion to support strategic priorities. National and international honors for quality, safety and patient experience include a 5-star Vizient rating for five years in a row, as well as a sixth consecutive Magnet designation and first-ever Magnet with distinction.
University of Utah Hospital (Salt Lake City). As the flagship of University of Utah Health, the only academic health system in Utah and Mountain West, University of Utah Hospital serves patients in Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Colorado and Nevada. It is part of a system with five hospitals, 12 health centers, 2,200 board-certified physicians, 28,000 team members, over two million patient annual visits, and the region’s most advanced specialty and quaternary care. For 13 years, it has been rated No. 1 in the Salt Lake City metropolitan area by U.S. News & World Report, with multiple national specialty listings. It has the region’s only level 1 trauma center and National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center, as well as leading academic rehabilitation, orthopedic and mental health programs. The hospital pairs patient care with groundbreaking research and also educates a majority of the region’s physicians, nurses, pharmacists and other clinicians. Globally known for pioneering discoveries in genetics, precision medicine, biomedical informatics, transplantation, cancer, cardiovascular medicine, neurosciences and orthopedics, the broader system’s landmark achievements include the first permanent artificial heart and the discovery of disease-causing genes like BRCA1. Innovation is accelerated by the Center for Medical Innovation, helping translate clinical ideas to new technologies, devices and startups to improve patient care globally. Investments in digital health, AI and robotics advance the next generation of care delivery.
University of Vermont Medical Center (Burlington). The University of Vermont Medical Center is a 499-bed tertiary care regional referral center and level 1 trauma center, serving as the flagship academic medical center for Vermont and northern New York. Partnering with the UVM Larner College of Medicine, the medical center provides advanced, specialized care to more than 1 million residents across Vermont and northern New York. The medical center is home to the University of Vermont Cancer Center and University of Vermont Children’s Hospital, and also serves as a community hospital for approximately 150,000 residents in Chittenden and Grand Isle counties. As part of a rural academic health system, the medical center works closely with the Robert Larner, M.D. College of Medicine and the College of Nursing and Health Sciences at the University of Vermont to drive innovation in rural health care delivery, education and research. U.S. News & World Report named the medical center a “Best Regional Hospital,” ranked No. 1 in Vermont and recognized in the Northern Vermont region. The medical center is rated “high-performing” in 13 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, colon cancer surgery, heart arrhythmia, heart attack and heart bypass surgery. The medical center and system are investing in AI, innovative partnerships, and technology that will benefit rural healthcare.
University of Washington Medical Center (Seattle). University of Washington Medical Center, a 910-bed academic medical center, is ranked in the top 50 hospitals in the nation for multiple adult specialties by U.S. News & World Report for 2026-27. It is the only hospital in Washington state with more than one national top 50 ranking, with rehabilitation medicine at No. 13, urology at No. 29, and cancer care at No. 42 in collaboration with Seattle’s Fred Hutch Cancer Center. As part of UW Medicine, the health system of the University of Washington, it serves as a referral hub for the five-state region of Washington, Alaska, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. In fiscal year 2025, UW Medical Center recorded more than 31,000 admissions, 420,000 clinic visits and 77,000 emergency department visits. The medical center is committed to offering the latest techniques, technologies and treatments with compassionate and patient-centered care. Among its many innovations, UW Medical Center developed the shunt that made long-term dialysis possible and performed the first kidney, heart and adult liver transplants in the Pacific Northwest. In 1994, it was the first hospital in the world to earn Magnet designation for nursing excellence. In 2024, it opened a new 150-bed hospital building that provides a safe and welcoming environment to treat patients with complex medical and behavioral health needs. Through its “3 Wishes” program, it is improving end-of-life experience for patients in ICUs by fulfilling a set of meaningful wishes for patients and their families.
VCU Medical Center (Richmond). VCU Medical Center is an 820-bed academic medical facility and the public medical campus of Virginia Commonwealth University, formerly known as the Medical College of Virginia. The medical center traces its legacy of health care back more than 175 years and serves as the only academic medical center in the region. VCU Medical Center is the only comprehensive level 1 trauma center in the region verified in adult, pediatric and burn trauma care, and is one of only two National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer centers in the state of Virginia. The medical center is also home to the region’s only full-service children’s hospital and is staffed by more than 800 physicians across 200 specialties. VCU Medical Center has been recognized by the American Nurses Credentialing Center as a Magnet-designated hospital, considered the most prestigious honor for nursing. U.S. News & World Report named VCU Medical Center the No. 1 hospital in Virginia and the best hospital in the metro Richmond area for the 16th consecutive year, recognizing its cardiology and orthopaedics programs among the nation’s best. The system is currently tackling new facility expansion plans.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center (Nashville, Tenn.). Vanderbilt University Medical Center is U.S. News & World Report’s 2026-27 top hospital in Tennessee. It is also consistently ranked as the Southeast’s best pediatric hospital. Vanderbilt is a pioneer in organ transplantation and preservation, and one of the few centers in the world able to help the most complex adult and pediatric patients. The Vanderbilt Transplant Center is currently the largest transplant center in the U.S. by volume, and its heart transplant team holds the world record for the most adult and pediatric heart transplants in a year. Vanderbilt also operates one of the busiest critical care centers in the region, and is Middle Tennessee’s only level 1 trauma and burn center for both adults and children. The medical center is home to the region’s only level 4 neonatal ICU, as well as the only National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive cancer center in Tennessee that treats both adult and pediatric patients. As a global leader in research, Vanderbilt receives more than $1 billion annually in research funding and ranked among the top 10 recipients of National Institutes of Health funding in the nation for fiscal year 2025. The medical center as a whole delivers care through eight hospitals, 2,200 licensed beds, and 180 ambulatory locations in Tennessee and surrounding states, supporting 3.5 million patient visits annually for adults and children. With its tri-part mission to advance patient care, research and education across the region, Vanderbilt is a major growth engine for Middle Tennessee, contributing $22.13 billion to the regional economy and generating 120,000 jobs.
Virginia Mason Medical Center (Seattle). Virginia Mason Medical Center, founded in 1920, is a nonprofit acute care hospital featuring 336 licensed beds and a multi-specialty group practice of more than 500 physicians. The medical center partners with the Benaroya Research Institute and is the flagship facility for Virginia Mason Franciscan Health, one of the largest healthcare systems in the Seattle-Tacoma area. Virginia Mason is home to Bailey-Boushay House, the first skilled nursing and outpatient chronic care management program in the U.S. designed specifically for people with HIV/AIDS. The medical center’s emergency department offers lower wait times than both the national average and the Washington state average. U.S. News & World Report named Virginia Mason Medical Center a “Best Regional Hospital,” ranked No. 1 in Washington and No. 1 in Seattle for 2026-27. The medical center is nationally ranked in one adult specialty and rated “high-performing” in 19 adult procedures and conditions, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve surgery, back surgery, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and colon cancer surgery. In 2026, the medical center also achieved American Heart Association’s “Get With The Guidelines” recognitions for stroke and heart failure, as well as American Heart Association’s “Target: Type 2 Diabetes Honor Roll” award.
Washington Regional Medical Center-Fayetteville (Ark.). Washington Regional Medical Center is a 425-bed, community-owned, nonprofit acute care hospital that serves as the flagship facility for the Washington Regional Medical System, Northwest Arkansas’s locally governed health care network. U.S. News & World Report ranked Washington Regional the No. 1 hospital in Arkansas for the sixth consecutive year, recognizing it as high performing in 13 areas of care, including abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, colon cancer surgery, diabetes, heart attack, hip replacement, knee replacement and maternity care. Washington Regional also maintains “straight-A” status in the Leapfrog hospital safety grades, a national distinction recognizing its performance in protecting patients from preventable harm and error. As the only level 2 trauma center in Northwest Arkansas, Washington Regional provides 24/7 immediate coverage by general surgery, orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, anesthesiology, emergency medicine, radiology and critical care. The medical center receives trauma patients from all surrounding counties, as well as areas of Oklahoma and Missouri.
WVU Medicine–J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital (Morgantown, W.Va.). J.W. Ruby Memorial Hospital is an 880-bed academic medical center and level 1 trauma center that serves as the flagship hospital of WVU Medicine. As the largest hospital in the WVU Medicine family, Ruby Memorial provides the most advanced level of care available to citizens of West Virginia and bordering states. U.S. News & World Report has ranked Ruby Memorial the No. 1 hospital in West Virginia and recognized it as a “Best Regional Hospital” for orthopaedics. The hospital has received its fifth Magnet designation from the American Nurses Credentialing Center. Ruby Memorial’s department of orthopedics maintains dedicated operating rooms and an inpatient floor for the care of musculoskeletal patients. Specialty areas at the hospital include bariatrics, the Center for Integrative Pain Management, the Center for Reproductive Medicine, Transplant Alliance and urology.
Yale New Haven (Conn.) Hospital. Yale New Haven Hospital is a nationally recognized academic medical center offering services across more than 100 specialty areas. Through its affiliation with Yale School of Medicine, it also advances patient care, research and innovation. Accredited by The Joint Commission, the hospital is routinely ranked among the nation’s best by U.S. News & World Report, earning the No. 1 hospital ranking in Connecticut for 2026-2027 and national recognition in geriatrics, neurology and neurosurgery, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics and psychiatry. As a destination for complex care, the hospital provides a full continuum of services, from diagnosis and advanced therapeutics to coordinated care management, supported by a robust academic and clinical research enterprise. As a leading acute care hospital, it cares for patients across the full spectrum of need, from routine and common medical conditions to the most complex cases requiring specialized expertise and advanced technology. For more than two centuries, the hospital has helped advance medicine while expanding access to specialized care across the Northeast. The hospital also serves as the primary teaching hospital for Yale School of Medicine, hosting approximately 1,400 residents, fellows and other trainees across more than 180 clinical education programs. Recent wins for the hospital include the August 2026 launch of a new crisis intervention center embedded in the emergency department at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, which is located on Yale New Haven Hospital’s campus.
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