Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas has again been named among the nation’s Top 100 Hospitals, extending a recent pattern of national recognition for the North County campus. In Scripps Health’s April 14 announcement, the system said Scripps Encinitas ranked No. 3 among 20 medium community hospitals in Premier’s 2026 list, published by Modern Healthcare. Scripps also said the hospital was recognized “for the second time in three years,” after making the same national Top 100 list in 2024.
According to Premier, the 2026 program evaluated 2,540 short-term, acute-care, nonfederal U.S. hospitals using publicly available data from 2019 through 2024. Premier said it assessed hospitals across 10 measures, including inpatient mortality, complications, healthcare-associated infections, 30-day mortality, 30-day readmissions, average length of stay, inpatient expense, Medicare spending per beneficiary, operating profit margin, and HCAHPS top-box scores. Premier said the program identifies hospitals that “consistently deliver high-quality care while improving operational efficiency, financial performance, and the patient experience.”
In the Scripps release, President and CEO Chris Van Gorder said, “Even with the historic challenges now facing the health care sector, Scripps continues to uphold our century-old founding mission to provide exceptional care to our patients.” Steve Miller, vice president and chief operations executive at Scripps Encinitas, said, “This wasn’t something that we applied for,” adding that the designation put “a national spotlight on the high-quality, data-driven care” provided by the hospital’s physicians, nurses, and staff.
Physicians should read the ranking as a broad hospital performance signal rather than a specialty-specific outcomes report. Still, the repeated recognition matters as a measure of consistency. In 2024, Scripps Encinitas also made the Top 100 list and was then described by Scripps as the only Southern California hospital included that year. That makes the 2026 result less of a one-time accolade and more of a repeat performance in the same national benchmarking program.