Two Rush hospitals again were rated among the best in the country for safety in the latest grades awarded by the Leapfrog Group, a nonprofit watchdog organization. Rush Copley Medical Center and Rush Oak Park Hospital both received ‘A’ grades, the highest possible. Rush University Medical Center received a ‘B’ grade.
Leapfrog announced the latest of its twice-yearly safety grades today, awarding grades to the more than 2,600 in the United States that it evaluated for their commitment to reducing errors, infections, and accidents that can harm patients.
Rush Copley, located in Aurora, now has received A grades each of the 15 times the Leapfrog Group has rated hospitals since June 2012 — putting it among an exclusive group of 41 (1.6 percent) of the hospitals receiving grades that have earned the top score every time. Rush Oak Park Hospital, in the near west suburb Oak Park, received its sixth consecutive A and its eighth overall. Rush University Medical Center previously has received 13 consecutive 'A' grades from Leapfrog.
“Our physicians and staff are focused on providing care that’s delivered with the highest standards of safety,” said Barry C. Finn, president and CEO of Rush Copley and executive vice president of the Rush system. “We continually strive to raise the bar for patient safety and patient experience — from process improvements to empowering front line staff — to provide the highest level of care."
“On a daily basis our excellent staff works to ensure patients are cared for in the safest environment. To be recognized for that effort with our sixth 'A' grade in a row by the Leapfrog Group is a reflection of the commitment and the dedication of the medical, nursing and professional staff at Rush Oak Park Hospital,” said Bruce Elegant, president and CEO of the hospital.
Rush System maintains high level of safety
“As they have for years, Leapfrog’s grades again show that the hospitals in the Rush University System for Health provide care with a high degree of patient safety every day, every week, every month and every year” said Dr. Omar Lateef, CEO of Rush University Medical Center and chief medical officer of the Medical Center and the Rush University System for Health. “In particular, Rush Copley Medical Center’s 15th straight 'A' demonstrates an extraordinary consistency in providing care safely, and Rush Oak Park Hospitals’ sixth straight 'A' similarly shows how the hospital has embedded safety practices in its care.”
Lateef notes that Rush University Medical Center’s ‘B’ grade resulted in part to errors in hospital claims data, which created the appearance of safety incidents that in fact had not occurred. “We’ve made changes to guard against these mistakes in the data and expect that our next grade from Leapfrog will recognize the extremely high level of patient safety at Rush University Medical Center, which actually improved as measured by a different hospital survey by Vizient. That exceptional safety is a big reason Vizient ranked the Medical Center second among 99 leading academic medical centers in its survey,” Lateef said.
Scores are based on 28 measures of hospital safety
Leapfrog used 28 measures of publicly available hospital data to assign scores of 'A', 'B', 'C', 'D' or 'F.' The score represents each hospital’s overall performance in keeping patients safe from preventable medical errors, accidents, injuries and infections while they are in the hospital.
The Leapfrog Group compiles the Hospital Safety Score under the guidance of the nation’s leading experts on patient safety in order to provide the public with information that people can use to protect themselves and their families. A full analysis of the data and methodology used is available on the Hospital Safety Score website.
To see the Rush hospitals’ scores as they compare nationally and locally, and to find safety tips for patients and their loved ones, visit the Hospital Safety Score website.
‘A’ grades are latest in steady stream of honors for Rush hospitals
The new CMS ratings are the latest in a consistent stream of recognitions of the high quality of care that Rush University Medical Center and the other Rush system hospitals provide. Unique among U.S. academic health systems, they include the following honors:
- In October, Rush University Medical Center was ranked second in the nation among 99 leading academic medical centers in the latest annual quality and accountability study conducted by Vizient Inc.
- All three Rush hospitals received four stars (out of a possible five) in the latest ratings by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which CMS published on its Hospital Compare website on Feb. 28.
- Rush University Medical Center received its fourth consecutive Magnet designation, the highest honor in nursing, in January 2016, and Rush Oak Park Hospital received Magnet status in March of that year. Rush Copley Medical Center is working towards Magnet status.
- All three Rush hospitals have received the Beacon Award for Excellence by the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses, which honors intensive care unit nursing teams as being exceptional and in the top tier nationally.
- The Leapfrog Group also has named each of the Rush hospitals a Top Hospital (which is a different honor than Leapfrog’s safety grade), designating Rush University Medical Center a Top Teaching Hospital five times.
- In March, the Human Rights Campaign — a civil rights organization that advocates for equality for people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and/or queer/questioning — named Rush University Medical Center a Leader in LGBT Health Equality for the tenth consecutive year. The HRC also named Rush Oak Park Hospital a leader for the fifth consecutive year. Rush Copley Medical Center is applying for leader status in 2019.
- Rush University Medical Center and Rush Oak Park Hospital both have received the Healthgrades Outstanding Patient Experience Award, which recognizes hospitals that provide an overall outstanding patient experience. Healthgrades evaluates patient experience performance by applying a scoring methodology to 10 patient experience measures, using data collected from the 32-question survey of the hospital’s own patients. Hospitals in the top 15 percent with the highest overall patient experience scores are recognized as Outstanding Patient Experience Award recipients.