Rankings

UC Davis Children’s Hospital has been recognized as a 2025–2026 Best Children’s Hospital by U.S. News & World Report, ranking among the top 50 hospitals nationwide in three specialties:

• Pediatric orthopaedics (#23), awarded in collaboration with Shriners Children’s Northern California, UC Davis Children’s Hospital’s longstanding partner in caring for children with burns, spinal cord injuries, orthopedic disorders and urological issues.
• Pediatric nephrology (#33).
• Pediatric pulmonology & lung surgery (#41).

UC Davis Children’s Hospital also ranked 7th in California and 8th in the Pacific Region, which includes Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington.

Newsweek magazine and Statista included the children’s hospital in their top 50 ranking of America’s Best Children’s Hospitals for 2025. The listing recognizes leading children’s hospitals in the United States across eight pediatric fields, including cardiology and cardiac surgery, endocrinology, gastroenterology and gastrointestinal surgery, neonatology, neurology and neurosurgery, oncology, orthopaedics and pulmonology. UC Davis Children’s Hospital was ranked 39th nationally in neonatology, 34th in cardiology and cardiac surgery and 34th in neurology and neurosurgery. UC Davis Children’s Hospital is the only hospital in Sacramento to be recognized.

Newsweek and Plant-A Insights Group named the health system as one of America’s Greatest Workplaces overall. This latest recognition builds on UC Davis Health’s growing national reputation as a model workplace. It follows previous honors from Forbes, including being named one of America’s Best Large Employers, one of California’s Best Employers and a Best Employer for Diversity and for Women. Standout programs include competitive benefits and support for career growth, a strong culture of diversity, equity and inclusion and meaningful improvements driven by employee feedback.

Forbes and Statista have named UC Davis Health as one of the best employers in California for 2025. In their annual Best Employers by State listing, they ranked UC Davis Health as No. 24 in the state overall, and No. 4 in healthcare and social services. The rankings are determined from a survey of more than 160,000 employees who evaluated their workplace on criteria such as wages, culture, professional advancement, and how the employer handles serious issues.

Newsweek and Plant-A Insights Group also listed UC Davis Health as one of America’s Greatest Workplaces for Mental Well-being 2025 for its investment in mental health, personal well-being and resilience across its workforce. The recognition highlighted its flexible, family-friendly workplace policies, comprehensive safety and wellness programs, expansive health and wellness resources and accessible mental health services for employees and families.

UC Davis Health recently received recertification from The Joint Commission as an Advanced Comprehensive Heart Attack Center. The certification process involves meeting rigorous standards and providing evidence that an organization delivers high-quality care that leads to improved clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction. The Joint Commission evaluates key areas such as timeliness and quality of heart attack care, care coordination, staff training, patient safety, data-driven performance improvement and compliance with clinical guidelines. The certification award to UC Davis Health represents its commitment to upholding the highest standards of health care quality and safety for patients, workforce and community.

UC Davis Medical Center has been honored with the American Heart Association’s Commitment to Quality award — an inaugural recognition that highlights hospitals demonstrating exceptional performance across multiple clinical areas in the Get With The Guidelines program. This new award celebrates an elite group of hospitals nationwide that have achieved high standards in at least three clinical categories. The medical center is one of only 158 hospitals in the country to meet the rigorous criteria for this distinction.

Hospitals receiving this award have demonstrated a comprehensive and sustained approach to quality improvement. By participating in three or more Get With The Guidelines programs, they commit to using real-time data registries, evidence-based protocols, and cross-disciplinary collaboration to elevate care across multiple specialties.

The medical center also earned four awards for its optimal care for heart and stroke patients. These awards honor hospitals that integrate research and evidence-based guidelines into clinical practice, supported by data that shows better patient results. The four awards include:

• Gold Plus in Coronary Artery Disease, STEMI
• Gold Plus in Heart Failure
• Gold Plus in Stroke
• Silver in Coronary Artery Disease, NSTEMI

Practice Greenhealth has recognized UC Davis Health as a national leader in environmental sustainability once again. UC Davis Health has been honored this year with the Emerald Award, which recognizes the top 20 percent of applicants (more than 500 hospitals). The award takes into consideration advanced sustainability programs with exemplary scores in multiple sustainability categories. Additionally, UC Davis Health received five designations in the Circles of Excellence, which honors up to 10 of the highest performing hospitals nationwide in various areas of sustainability. The five areas include sustainable procurement, water, transportation, green building and food. Practice Greenhealth is the nation’s leading organization dedicated to environmental sustainability in health care. More than 1,400 U.S. hospitals and health care systems are part of its network.