St. Paul came in at number one on a national
ranking of health care systems, particularly when it came to dental visits, low breast cancer fatalities, and heart care treatment.
Reported by the
Commonwealth Fund in its first-ever scorecard on the quality of health care, St. Paul beat out other Minnesota communities on the list like Rochester (no. 3), Minneapolis (no. 4) and St. Cloud (no. 7).
The report looked at performance in 306 communities nationally, and found that health care access, cost, quality, and outcomes can vary greatly from one community to the next, even within the same state.
The executive summary noted: "The findings show that local health system performance is linked across all dimensions. Better access to care [is] associated with higher quality and better outcomes."