I apologize in advance for the length of my response but I get worked up about this stuff.
First off New Hampshire overall has the 5th best healthcare system in the country and ranked for its treatment and prevention of disease we are the second best in the nation. No one should worry about moving to New Hampshire when it comes to healthcare (All of the data comes from the Commonwealth Fund and here is the link)
As to our local heathcare options we are in great shape (and I am including all of our hospitals - LRGH, Speare and Huggins). The consumer reports ranking are very misleading. If you look into them further you will see that our own little LRGH ranked HIGHER than Mass Gen, Tufts Medical, Beth Israel, the Lahey Clinic and Boston Medical. Apparently while LRGH has a lower score than some NH hospitals its kicking the crap out of the best hospitals in Mass! The only thing that LRGH scored poorly on was a survey on how good they were at distributing information on prescription drugs.
I am in the business of taking people to the hospital and I take my family’s health very seriously. I used to have a potentially deadly heart condition for over 20 years. I’ve been to the best docs in both NYC and San Francisco and none have ever able to effectively treat it. When I moved back to NH 6 years ago it started acting up again. I wanted referrals to the best cardiologists at Mass Gen and Dartmouth. While meeting with an LRGH cardiologist to get the referral she correctly diagnosed my condition and had heart surgery set up for two days later (and she gave me her cell phone number and email address!). I dealt with a condition that caused my heart to occasionally beat at over 300 bpm for over 20 years and it was an LRGH cardiologist who finally solved my problem!
I am treated by LRGH, my wife is treated by LRGH and my baby is treated by LRGH. They are a great hospital and are only 12 minutes from our house. We do occasionally get referred to specialist at other hospitals but that is the nature of the beast. A small community hospital isn’t going to be able to do everything. My actual heart surgery was done at CMC. But for 95% of what we need LRGH is local and they do a good job.
That’s not to say everything is perfect at LRGH. I personally would like to see a nicer ER and have every patient room be a private room. These aren’t just LRGH problems though these are problems with every hospital in America today.
If you would like to tour of what is going on over LRGH just PM me and I would be happy to set it up for you. In a small community like ours we are incredibly lucky to have LRGH.
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