Hospital Rankings: How to Stay on Top with PINC AI™ Quality Enterprise

Key takeaways:

• Hospital rankings from credible organizations can help prospective patients compare healthcare facilities based on quality, safety and affordability.
• The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade® informs the public on driving factors for patient safety.
• The 2022 spring Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade report revealed that more than half of Premier’s members subscribing to Quality Ratings tools achieved an “A” or “B” grade with this most recent release.

For more on this topic:

• Ready to take your hospital’s or health system’s quality improvement program to the next level? Check out our Quality Enterprise comprehensive suite of solutions, part of our PINC AI™ technology and services platform.

It's not uncommon for patients to check online reviews before deciding which healthcare facility to patronize. As a result, hospital rankings are becoming more significant than ever before. Although rankings aren't everything, they certainly have a big impact on how healthcare organizations are perceived - particularly in areas that are dense with competition.

Annual hospital rankings from credible organizations can help patients compare healthcare facilities side-by-side based on quality, safety and affordability. The Leapfrog Group is one such ratings service, with more than 20 years’ experience in developing metrics to enable informed consumer comparisons. Leapfrog ratings are used in a variety of consumer-focused publications, including MSNBC, The New York Times, AARP and – most recently - Money, a digital financial publication, which just recently released its list of Best Hospitals in America .

Considering the outsized influence that Leapfrog ratings can have on consumer decision making, it’s vital that healthcare providers are optimized to perform well within Leapfrog’s criteria.

Making a Difference with PINC AI™ Solutions

More widely known is The Leapfrog Group’s Hospital Safety Grade. Based on Premier’s review of Leapfrog public data, the most recent report released in spring 2022 revealed that more than half of Premier’s members subscribing to Quality Ratings tools achieved an “A” or “B” grade. In fact, Premier members subscribed to PINC AI™ Quality Enterprise outperformed competitors and, on average, Quality Enterprise members scored higher than non-Quality Enterprise members.

The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade informs the public on driving factors for patient safety including infection prevention through effective handwashing, the value of patient safety through support of strong healthcare teams, and initiatives for error prevention such as protocols and standards.

Twice a year, hospitals are awarded an A-F letter grade based on safety measures performance sourced from public Medicare data and from the Leapfrog Hospital Survey. Prospective patients can access these report cards and use them to influence where to seek out inpatient care. PINC AI™ Quality Enterprise members know that transparent projections correctly identify risk and opportunity so teams can take appropriate action to achieve better performance in practice and ratings.

National ratings tracking programs like the Leapfrog Patient Safety Grade are a high priority for any healthcare organization to ensure that the true value of care is illustrated.

PINC AI™ supports member organizations in continuous improvement on performance and ratings through solutions in both quality improvement and clinical surveillance. Hospitals are improving infection prevention with PINC AI ™ Clinical Surveillance technology, TheraDoc®, for improved CDC National Healthcare Safety Network (NHNS) measure scores, which in turn lead to improved Leapfrog Safety Grades. In the summer of 2021, the PINC AI ™ Quality Enterprise's Leapfrog Safety Grade Calculator launched as part of a suite of interactive tools for tracking ratings. Features in the Leapfrog Safety Grade Calculator allow users to review the details of the safety grade measures, view a representation of their measure forecast and generate “what if” scenarios for goal setting.

Success at Member Health Systems

The team at AdventHealth achieves ongoing success with the PINC AI ™ Quality Enterprise suite of technology, including its analytics and benchmarking capabilities.

AdventHealth has always recognized the importance of reporting outcomes and delivering quality care. “The bottom line is to make sure our patients are well taken care of and that this care is accurately reported,” said Janice Cromer, AdventHealth’s System Director of Clinical Documentation Integrity.

Among a large population of Premier member organizations, AdventHealth had over 70 percent of their facilities receive an “A” grade this spring, and recently was awarded the Emerald Award for Outstanding Achievement by a Health Care System, a first for any health system. The achievement honors AdventHealth’ s performance across Leapfrog’s Hospital Safety Grades and Top Hospital award, which is one of the most competitive quality awards a hospital and its team members can receive. Notably, AdventHealth Daytona Beach, sets the pace among the ranks of the 22 Leapfrog straight-‘A’ hospitals.

Based on Premier’s review of Leapfrog public data as of May 2022, hospitals subscribing to the PINC AI™ Quality Ratings tools on average scored higher compared to the Leapfrog national average. With over 25 percent of all Leapfrog-graded facilities subscribing to the PINC AI™ Quality Enterprise technology, there is a shared vision for high quality and safety for all served by these organizations with a commitment to patient care. Premier remains committed to supporting Quality Enterprise members in improving Leapfrog Safety Grades. Congratulations to all hospitals achieving commendable grades this spring and check out our high scoring Premier members by searching for your hospital’s safety grade.

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