I completely agree that finding the "right" doctor can be very difficult. The large academic hospitals are often a good bet, but there are also, depending on what ails you, specialist hospitals that can be much better, as they tend to see many more of the specific case. You may very well be sent to the resident expert at that hospital, but that expert may be far from expert when compared to other facilities.

In one case I am familiar with, someone with an acoustic neuroma was offered treatment at a few very well known, large, academic hospitals, but those hospitals only treated about 25 or so of these cases a year. It was amazing to me that a general neurosurgeon would offer treatment when they only had ever done 20 of the relevant surgeries in their career, and not mention that there were facilities with vastly more experience. Going with a specialist hospital, the patient found a team that did a few hundred of the relevant surgeries each year and achieved a good outcome.

This leads me to think that neuro and other surgery might be better off following the regional heart hospital model so that expertise gets concentrated.