SMH scores ‘A’ on hospital safety score; best grade in metro area

Now, for the first time, patients can also review a hospital’s past safety performance alongside its current grade, allowing them to determine which local hospitals have the best track record in patient safety and which have demonstrated consistent improvement. This places the university’s medical center among an elite group of 133 institutions dubbed by Leapfrog as Straight A hospitals.

– Creation of a transition of care initiative with a goal of streamlining processes both within the hospital and outside facilities to make patient care more efficient and patient centered.

The Leapfrog Group is a national, nonprofit organization that uses the collective leverage of large purchasers of health care to initiate breakthrough improvements in the safety, quality and affordability of health care for Americans.

The Hospital Safety Score is calculated by top patient safety experts, peer-reviewed, fully transparent and free to the public.

We regularly report our patient safety and quality metrics to our Board of Directors. “That’s a huge ask…only about 5% of hospitals achieve that and we’d love to see more, because consistency is one of the most important things”, said Jillian Laffrey, senior communications and membership coordinator for Leapfrog.

“Hospital transparency is essential in providing the safest care for consumers”, said Karen van Caulil, president and chief executive officer of the Florida Health Care Coalition.

Only 133 of the 2,530 hospitals nationwide that Leapfrog evaluated for the latest score have received straight A’s. Maine ranked #1 in the country with over 68% of the state’s hospital receive A grades.

The majority of hospitals in Central Florida earned an A for patient safety, according to a national report.

Baptist Medical Center East in Montgomery also received an A, along with DeKalb Regional Medical Center, Medical Center Enterprise, Providence Hospital in Mobile and Russellville Hospital.

Earning “A” grades were Cape Canaveral Hospital, Holmes Regional Medical Center in Melbourne, Palm Bay Hospital, Parrish Medical Center in Titusville.

Last spring, the scores showed that urban hospitals as a whole performed better in safety than rural hospitals, and that many hospitals continue to struggle to control hospital-acquired infections, FierceHealthcare previously reported.

Fifteen of the 40 Colorado hospitals ranked in the biannual survey scored A’s, placing them in the top 10 nationally, said Missy Danforth, Leapfrog vice president for hospital ratings.

The study measures only patient safety measures, she said, and not quality or effectiveness of health care procedures. The score uses 28 measures of hospital safety data in order to create a numerical score, ranging from A to F. The score represents the hospitals overall capability of keeping patients safe from avoidable harm.