Lord's Cricket Ground in London - commonly referred to as the "Home of Cricket" - famously slopes toward its south end, with a drop of more than eight feet compared to the north side. Professional cricket players, depending on their hitting stance or pitching style, use this topographical feature to their advantage whenever possible.

The slope, and similar ones at other sports venues, offers insight into the origins of the modern phrase - "Leveling the playing field." The thinking goes that all athletes should be afforded the same playing conditions, so that the outcome of an event is truly based on skill and not on random, external factors.

An unleveled playing field is at the heart of a major problem with how the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is judging hospital quality - and the field's slope is affecting Maryland's ratings.

Here's the issue: CMS' star quality rankings for hospitals do not account for the unique way Maryland's hospitals report data. Maryland's hospitals operate under a more stringent quality program, but historically were not required to submit certain inpatient and outpatient data or present-on-admission codes to CMS until 2014. As a result, Maryland's hospitals appear to lag on quality measures when in fact, the problem is that the playing field isn't level. And with more national publications, like U.S. News & World Report, relying on CMS data for their own hospital rankings, the flawed rankings gain even greater exposure.

So, what are we doing to rectify the situation? MHA has submitted comments to CMS requesting that Maryland's hospitals be exempt from the proposed star rating program until all data constituting the ratings contain the proper present-on-admission codes and, therefore, are appropriately comparable to hospitals in other states. We are also seeking a joint meeting with CMS and the Health Services Cost Review Commission (HSCRC) to determine how to address the problem. HSCRC has also submitted comments to CMS echoing MHA's concerns.

In addition, MHA has submitted a letter to U.S. News & World Report's Health Rankings Editor outlining the biases in the current comparison and requesting that the publication make those discrepancies clear so that readers are not misled by unfair analyses.

There are also things hospitals can do to help level the playing field. Hospitals must work to ensure that data submitted to CMS are as clean as data submitted to the Health Services Cost Review Commission.

Every hospital leader wants their patients to be well informed and empowered to take charge of their health care. But if the information presented to them is based on biased data, their health care choices can suffer. That's why it's so important that CMS, U.S. News & World Report and others who make use of biased data act swiftly to correct an inaccuracy that, until addressed, will continue to distort the quality improvements you and your team have worked so hard to achieve.