Scripps Named Among Top 5 Medium-Sized US Health Systems

Scripps Health once again has been named among the top five medium-sized health systems in the nation based on an annual study conducted by the health care improvement company Premier Inc. Scripps ranked No. 2 in the annual list and was the only Southern California system to be named among a broader list of top 15 health systems in 2026.

The winners were announced Tuesday in the online edition of Modern Healthcare magazine.

"We are proud of the exceptional care that our physicians, nurses and employees deliver to patients every day throughout San Diego County," said Scripps President and CEO Chris Van Gorder. "This recognition by Premier wouldn't be possible without a shared commitment to keep our patients at the center of every decision, every interaction and every innovation."

Ghazala Sharieff, MD, MBA, Scripps corporate executive vice president and chief medical and operations officer for acute care, pointed to a continuous effort to improve quality by focusing on metrics directly tied to patients. "We want our patients to have the kind of care that we would want for ourselves and our families, resulting in shorter hospital stays, improved health outcomes and a better overall experience."

Study researchers used publicly available data sources and measures to evaluate 336 health systems with at least two short-term, acute care hospitals for inpatient and extended care quality, operational efficiency and patient experience. The analysis produced an objective measure of overall health system performance and insight into the ability of the best performing health system hospitals to deliver consistent top results across the communities they serve.

To account for differences in scale among health systems, the report categorized health systems into three groups - large, medium and small - and named the top five in each group, for a total of 15 recognized systems. Scripps has made the overall best 15 list eight times.

Health systems do not apply for the annual listing, and winners do not pay to market the honor. In previous years, the study was produced under a variety of other ownership names such as PINC AI, Merative, IBM Watson Health and Truven Health Analytics.

Health system data evaluated by Premier came from the Medicare Provider Analysis and Review and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Care Compare website. The systems were compared using eight performance measures covering inpatient mortality, complications, health care associated infections, 30-day mortality rate, 30-day readmission rate, average length of stay, the Medicare spend per beneficiary measure and CMS patient surveys.