When Kate Probst learned she needed surgery to remove
a brain tumor, she launched a nationwide search for the
best medical care. Probst, an environmental-policy analyst
who lives in McLean, Virginia, consulted doctors in nearby
Washington, D.C. She telephoned specialists at Duke
University Medical Center in North Carolina and sent her
records to experts at Massachusetts General Hospital in
Boston and the Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix.
Ultimately, Probst chose the second of two neurosurgeons
HEART, GENERAL
TK CREDI T
she interviewed at Johns
Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. Her operation to
remove the benign tumor
was a success.
But a year earlier, in
2006, when Probst received a diagnosis of early
breast cancer, she looked
no farther away than a
community hospital a few
miles from her home. That
time, her condition was so
common, and treatment so
uniform, that there was no
compelling reason to leave
town. “I was told there were
ten doctors here who could
do it,” said Probst, 52, who
underwent a lumpectomy
followed by radiation and
has not had a recurrence.
A generation ago most
ailing Americans received
treatment in their home-
town hospitals, no matter
how rare the illness or grave
the diagnosis. Today it is in-
creasingly common to ven-
ture hundreds or thousands
of miles for care. Although
statistics are elusive, several
of the largest U.S. hospitals
report significant increases
in out-of-state patients dur-
ing the past decade. M.D.
Anderson Cancer Center
in Houston, for example,
recorded a 69 percent jump
between 1999 and 2007.
Cleveland Clinic
Cleveland, OH
Mayo Clinic
Rochester, MN
Children’s
Hospital Boston
Boston, MA
New York–Presbyterian/
Columbia
New York, NY
Massachusetts
General Hospital
Boston, MA
Brigham and
Women’s Hospital
Boston, MA
The Johns Hopkins Hospital
Baltimore, MD
Stanford University
Medical Center
Palo Alto, CA
Texas Heart Institute
at St. Luke’s
Episcopal Hospital
Houston, TX
CANCER, GENERAL
For an interactive
map of top-ranked
U. S. hospitals, visit
aarpmagazine
.org/health.
The University of Texas
M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
Houston, TX
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
New York, NY
Dana-Farber
Cancer Institute
Boston, MA
Mayo Clinic
Rochester, MN
City of Hope
Duarte, CA
The Johns Hopkins Hospital
Baltimore, MD
Duke University Hospital
Durham, NC
Roswell Park
Cancer Institute
Buffalo, NY
