I’ve been so focused on researching transplant centers that I didn’t realize Medicare rates dialysis facilities. I searched for my dialysis clinic, St. Joseph Hospital Renal Center, and they only have a 4/5 star rating for quality of patient care, but a 5/5 for patient survey. Looking at the rating details, I think they got dinged for a lower % of adult patients who had enough waste removed from their blood during hemodialysis. That explains why they want me to increase my dialysis time when my Kt/V result came back at 1.18 (should be at least 1.2). Across the street from my dialysis clinic is Satellite Healthcare Orange, which was my center for peritoneal dialysis. They have 5/5 stars for both ratings; maybe I should have gone there for hemodialysis instead of returning to St. Joseph. There is also a DaVita facility nearby. They have a 5/5 from Medicare but only 3/5 from their patients.
Some other interesting statistics:
| DaVita | St. Joseph | Satellite | California | National | |
| Preventing bloodstream infections | As Expected | As Expected | Better than Expected | ||
| Adult patients who had enough waste removed from their blood during hemodialysis | 96% | 89% | 97% | 96% | 97% |
| Adult patients who had enough waste removed from their blood during peritoneal dialysis | 97% | N/A | 93% | 89% | 91% |
| Rate of fistula | Better than Expected | As Expected | As Expected | ||
| Adult patients who had a catheter (tube) left in a vein for at least 3 consecutive complete months for their regular hemodialysis treatments | 8% | 12% | 6% | 13% | 13% |
| Frequency of hospital admission | As Expected | As Expected | Better than Expected | ||
| Frequency of hospital readmission | As Expected | As Expected | As Expected | ||
| Rate of patient death | As Expected | As Expected | As Expected |
As I was debating the fistula surgery, I noticed most of the patients at St. Joseph is getting dialysis through a fistula. From the data above, there’s more catheters at St. Joseph than at DaVita and Satellite. Medicare states that higher rate of fistula is better, and lower usage of catheter is also better. This also likely affected St. Joseph’s Medicare rating. Sorry!
For patient survey, DaVita got average ratings for kidney doctors and clinic staff, while St. Joseph and Satellite got better than average numbers.
Life with chronic diseases 