by Doug Campbell
Vanderbilt University Adult Hospital (VUAH) was once again named among the safest hospitals in the nation after receiving a spring safety grade of “A” from the Leapfrog group.
Leapfrog is a coalition of public and private purchasers of employee health coverage that works to encourage health care safety, quality and affordability.
Leapfrog’s Hospital Safety Score uses numerous measures of publicly available hospital data to produce a single score representing a hospital’s overall capacity to keep patients safe from infections, injuries and medical errors.
These measures come from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the Leapfrog Hospital Survey and secondary data sources such as the American Hospital Association’s Annual Survey and Information Technology Supplement. The measures are weighted and then combined to produce a single composite score that is published as an A, B, C, D or F letter grade.
To determine a safety grade, Leapfrog not only looks at outcome measures but also process measures such as staff responsiveness and structural measures such as the overall hospital environment and how thoroughly technology is embedded into the delivery of care.
“Leapfrog top scores are awarded based on performance and the way we care for our patients and their families,” said C. Wright Pinson, MBA, MD, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Health System Officer for Vanderbilt University Medical Center. “This ‘A’ grade from Leapfrog is the latest validation of the dedication and skill of our employees, and I want to congratulate everyone for earning this top grade.”
In the recent survey, more than 2,600 hospitals across the nation were assigned grades of A, B, C, D or F for safety, and only 30% received an “A.” The safety score for each hospital can be found at http://hospitalsafetyscore.org/.
Together, Leapfrog members provide health benefits to more than 37 million Americans in all 50 states.
