[column width=”1/1″ last=”true” title=”” title_type=”single” animation=”none” implicit=”true”]
I am proud to announce that the University of Chicago Medicine has once again earned an “A” rating for hospital safety from the prestigious Leapfrog Group, the industry watchdog that tracks thousands of hospitals nationwide. It’s our 9th consecutive “A” rating from Leapfrog. We have scored an “A” rating in every survey period since Leapfrog began publishing safety scores in 2012.
While 798 hospitals received an “A” rating in the Spring 2016 survey, out of 2,571 hospitals examined, only 98 hospitals nationally have received the highest rating for all nine survey periods. This consistency, despite regularly revised methodologies and metrics, is the result of all the hard work of our faculty and staff and our dedication to the goal of making this hospital one of the safest in the country. There is no higher priority in anything that we do.
None of us should take this exemplary performance for granted. I do not. It is due to a very well-coordinated team effort and requires many parts of the organization to function at the highest level. Leapfrog uses 30 different evidence-based measures of patient safety to produce a single A, B, C, D or F score, representing a hospital’s overall capacity to keep patients safe from preventable harm.
These results would not be possible without the leadership and dedication to our patients of President Sharon O’Keefe, Stephen Weber, MD, Chief Medical Officer, Michael Howell, MD, MPH, Chief Quality Officer, Krista Curell, Esq., RN, Vice President, Chief Compliance Officer, and Debi Albert, MSN, MBA, RN, NEA-BC, Senior Vice President, Patient Care Services, and Chief Nursing Officer, to name a few. In addition, I want to recognize the clinical department chairs, section chiefs, and our entire clinical staff for their ongoing diligence to patient safety as a key mission of this institution.
We are among an elite group of U.S. hospitals in terms of delivering the highest level of care in one of the safest health care environments in the country. I thank you all for your support in our ongoing efforts.
[/column]