On January 1, 2025, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) launched HCAHPS 2.0, representing the most comprehensive update to the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) survey since its inception nearly 20 years ago.
This modernization introduces new survey items, revised domains, and updated reporting structures—all aimed at better capturing what truly matters to patients during hospitalization.
This revision to HCAHPS marks a significant shift in how healthcare systems are being evaluated moving forward, and poses a critical opportunity for healthcare leaders to reassess how to best drive performance and assure patient experience excellence.
Early National Trends: What the Data Reveals
In collaboration with PRC, the Healthcare Experience Foundation analyzed early HCAHPS 2.0 data drawn from 18,167 patient surveys across the United States (discharges from Q1 2025) using CMS-approved phone methodology. With a 32% response rate, this dataset offers one of the first national looks at emerging trends in the HCAHPS 2.0 framework.
Regression modeling identified the top drivers of two essential performance metrics: Overall Hospital Rating (Figure 1) and Likelihood to Recommend (Figure 2).
Key Drivers of HCAHPS Overall Measures
These Key Drivers are the strongest early predictors of overall performance and provide data-driven guidance to help prioritize patient experience initiatives under the updated HCAHPS survey.
Strategic Implications for Healthcare Leaders
Across both domains, one thing is resoundingly clear: patients are keenly perceptive of the care they receive, especially as it relates to how healthcare teams work together, revealing the importance of staff cohesion in a patient’s overall rating of a hospital, and their likelihood to recommend that hospital to others.
Data collected from a new question included in the revised HCAHPS survey asking patients to define the nature of their visit underscores the importance of care coordination across emergency and hospital based medicine teams. Nearly two-thirds (65.7%) of responses identified their hospital visit as unplanned compared to 36.1% of planned hospitalizations (Figure 3).
The updated HCAHPS framework not only reflects evolving patient priorities—it provides clear direction on how to respond. Healthcare organizations now have a data-driven path to focus efforts and investments where they matter most.
“These insights are valuable to respond nimbly to patient feedback and equip our caregivers to create more consistent patient-centered experiences.” Steve Meth, Vice President and Chief Experience Officer, Johns Hopkins Medicine
Recommendations for Improvement:
- Foster Team-Based Care: Align leaders, physicians, and staff around coordinated, interdisciplinary collaboration.
- Advance Communication Skills: Strengthen empathic listening, clarity, and responsiveness at every level of care.
- Respond Proactively to Needs: Improve response times and system readiness to meet patient needs efficiently.
- Promote Rest & Recovery: Implement policies that protect patient rest, reduce disruptions, and create healing environments.
- Leverage Relationship Rounding: Use structured rounding to validate care experiences, offer real-time coaching, and recognize excellence.
A Moment of Opportunity
HCAHPS 2.0 is more than a technical revision—it’s a strategic inflection point. The new survey structure gives healthcare systems a renewed opportunity to realign culture, practices, and priorities around what patients value most.
By grounding improvement efforts in the early key drivers of experience, organizations can enhance patient trust, elevate caregiver engagement, and drive sustainable performance gains in this new era.
This special report was developed in collaboration with healthcare researchers and statisticians at Professional Research Consultants (PRC), a third-party data and research consultancy, utilizing data collected from 18,167 discharge surveys administered and collected in Q1 2025.
Special thanks to our partners at PRC—Andrea Paseka Senior Consulting Analyst, Dr. Joe Inguanzo CEO, and Audrey Page, SVP Patient Experience Solutions—for their valuable contributions and insights. This work is stronger because of your shared dedication.
About
The Healthcare Experience Foundation is a nationally recognized, patient-centered executive leadership and development consultancy that coaches and trains 7,500+ healthcare leaders, providers, and staff across 600+ American hospital systems. Healthcare Experience Foundation partners with organizations committed to care, helping them improve their HCAHPS scores by an average of 24 national percentile points. For more information, visit the Healthcare Experience Foundation at healthcareexperience.org.
PRC is a leading national survey and research firm that supports healthcare teams dedicated to Healthcare Excellence. For 40 years, PRC has been committed to delivering world class patient experiences, employee and physician engagement, community health, and safe care for the past 40 years. For more information, visit PRC at prcexcellence.com.
