Department of Health and Human Services (DHS) Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) – Compendium of U.S. Health System

Description:

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s (AHRQ) Compendium of U.S. Health Systems is a suite of files that provide information on hospitals, group practices, outpatient sites, nursing homes, and home health care organizations across the United States. Facilities in these files are linked through a “system” file that identifies which facilities belong to the same health system. The group practice file has not been published on PolicyMap because the data were not provided at the address level.

AHRQ defines a health system as follows: “A health system includes at least one hospital and at least one group of physicians that provides comprehensive care (including primary and specialty care) who are connected with each other and with the hospital through common ownership or joint management.” Additionally, a health system must include at least one non-federal acute care hospital, at least 50 physicians, and at least 10 primary care physicians.

Organizations in the source are aggregated to their highest level of ownership, meaning subsidiary systems of larger national systems are not listed separately. As a result, AHRQ notes that not all health systems operating in certain states or local markets may appear in the source. For more information on these files and AHRQ’s methodology for identifying health systems, please visit:https://www.ahrq.gov/chsp/data-resources/compendium.html.