The University of Alabama at Birmingham Health System, which is committed to providing the highest quality of health care, is consistently rated among the best medical centers in the nation. UAB Hospital is among 3 percent of hospitals nationwide, and the only one in Alabama, to make the U.S. News list of “Best Hospitals” (ranked 19 straight years). It is also the only area hospital to receive National Research Corporation Consumer Choice Award and was first runner-up for the 2008 National Hospital of the Year Award.
As an academic medical center, UAB excels at taking basic science discoveries from “bench to bedside,” quickly translating the major breakthroughs in the lab into viable new treatments and cures for disease. Classified as an institution of “very high research activity” by the Carnegie Foundation – a designation held only by the nation’s top 96 public or private universities, and no other in Alabama – UAB receives more than $400 million annually in research grants and contracts and ranks in the top 25 nationally in NIH funding.
As the state’s largest employer with over 18,000 employees, UAB has an annual impact of $3.6 billion on the state of Alabama. In early 2009, UAB was named to the President's Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll, the highest federal recognition a university can achieve for its commitment to service-learning and civic engagement. And in 2007, The Association of American Colleges and Universities ranked UAB among the nation’s 18 best at educating students for personal and social responsibility.