By Nicholas Roznovsky and Elizabeth Fernandez
Clockwise, from top left: UCSF Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital, UCSF Helen Diller Medical Center at Parnassus Heights, UCSF Medical Center at Mission Bay, and UCSF Medical Center at Mount Zion
UCSF Medical Center and the UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences have once again been recognized as one of the nation's top centers for adult psychiatry in the U.S. News & World Report 2020-2021 Best Hospitals survey. UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences moved up one spot from last year's rankings into 8th nationwide, marking the sixth year in a row that UCSF has been honored as one of the country's best hospitals for mental health research and treatment.
U.S. News’ 2020-2021 rankings were calculated based on ratings provided by psychiatric specialists from across the country over the past three years. UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences remains the only psychiatric department in Northern California included in the top echelon.
In this year’s results, which were released July 28, UCSF ranked 8th on the national Best Hospitals Honor Roll and among the nation’s leading medical centers in all 15 specialties for which it was assessed. The rankings were drawn from evaluations of more than 4,550 hospitals across the country.
“This recognition reflects the dedication of our staff to providing the best and most compassionate care for our patients,” said Mark R. Laret, chief executive officer and president of UCSF Health, which includes UCSF Medical Center, UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals, and UCSF Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital. “In these challenging times, amidst a global pandemic, we want every patient to feel confident knowing that these rankings reflect both expertise and safety for any specialty care, primary care and screenings they require.”
In addition to psychiatry, UCSF Medical Center ranked among the top 10 centers nationwide in nine other specialty areas: neurology and neurosurgery (2nd), diabetes and endocrinology (3rd), rheumatology (7th), urology (7th), geriatrics (8th), nephrology (8th), ophthalmology (9th), pulmonology and lung surgery (9th), and cancer (10th). It was the top-ranked hospital overall in Northern California, including ranking 1st in the San Francisco metro area, and was also was the highest-ranked hospital in Northern California in 12 specialty areas.
“These rankings, across such a broad range of expertise, are an indication of our steadfast commitment to advancing health in our community by providing the highest level of care,” said Sam Hawgood, MBBS, chancellor of UC San Francisco. “We’re very proud of the physicians, nurses, technicians, and staff who compose the UCSF Health team and their consistently excellent work.”
About U.S. News & World Report Best Hospital rankings
U.S. News & World Report's hospital rankings, which began in 1990, are designed to enable patients and their physicians to make informed decisions about where to receive care for challenging health conditions and common elective procedures. The specialty rankings assess hospital performance in highly complex areas of inpatient care and aim to identify medical centers that treat patients whose conditions are the most serious or challenging, due to underlying conditions, procedure difficulty, advanced age or other medical issues.
The 11 hospitals ranked in adult psychiatry this year were named among the best for difficult cases and procedures by at least 5 percent of the psychiatric specialists who responded to U.S. News surveys in 2018, 2019, and 2020. U.S. News does not currently issue rankings for child and adolescent psychiatry.
Complete rankings are available on the U.S. News & World Report website and will be published in the magazine’s “Best Hospitals 2021” guidebook in mid-September.
About UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
The UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute are among the nation's foremost resources in the fields of child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric mental health. Together they constitute one of the largest departments in the UCSF School of Medicine and the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, with a mission focused on research (basic, translational, clinical), teaching, patient care, and public service.
UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences conducts its clinical, educational, and research efforts at a variety of locations in Northern California, including Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital; UCSF Medical Centers at Parnassus Heights, Mission Bay, and Mount Zion; UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals in San Francisco and Oakland; Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center; the San Francisco VA Health Care System; UCSF Fresno; and numerous community-based sites around the San Francisco Bay Area.
About the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences
The UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, established by the extraordinary generosity of Joan and Sanford I. "Sandy" Weill, brings together world-class researchers with top-ranked physicians to solve some of the most complex challenges in the human brain.
The UCSF Weill Institute leverages UCSF’s unrivaled bench-to-bedside excellence in the neurosciences. It unites three UCSF departments—Neurology, Psychiatry, and Neurological Surgery—that are highly esteemed for both patient care and research, as well as the Neuroscience Graduate Program, a cross-disciplinary alliance of nearly 100 UCSF faculty members from 15 basic-science departments, as well as the UCSF Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases, a multidisciplinary research center focused on finding effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia, Parkinson’s disease, and other neurodegenerative disorders.
About UCSF
The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is exclusively focused on the health sciences and is dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care. UCSF Health, which serves as UCSF’s primary academic medical center, includes top-ranked specialty hospitals and other clinical programs, and has affiliations throughout the Bay Area.
