NYC Hospital Group to Advertise Error Rates : The strategy: If mortality and infection data are made public, then areas for improvement can be identified.

Such efforts may be unusual now, but they are the wave of the future, Mr. Conway said. The public wants the information, states are requiring its disclosure, and the federal government is now refusing to pay for illnesses that could have been prevented—including hospital-acquired infections.

“We're going to see more and more hospitals taking responsibility like this,” he predicted. “This is the end of the beginning, and the beginning of something new.”