AUSTIN, Texas — All eligible St. David’s HealthCare facilities were recently awarded an “A” from The Leapfrog Group’s Spring 2021 Hospital Safety Grades. This national distinction recognizes hospitals’ efforts to provide safer healthcare and protect patients from harm. St. David’s HealthCare is the only hospital system to receive an “A” for all eligible facilities in the Austin area.
The Leapfrog Group is an independent, national nonprofit organization committed to improving healthcare quality and safety for patients. The Hospital Safety Grade assigns a letter grade to hospitals across the country every six months based on their performance in preventing medical errors, injuries, accidents and infections among patients in their care.
St. David’s Medical Center, St. David’s North Austin Medical Center, St. David’s South Austin Medical Center, St. David’s Round Rock Medical Center and St. David’s Georgetown Hospital all received an “A” rating. St. David’s Medical Center is the only hospital in the state to receive straight “A” ratings since The Leapfrog Group launched the Hospital Safety ScoreSM initiative (now known as Hospital Safety Grades) in 2012. Heart Hospital of Austin and St. David’s Surgical Hospital were not included in the study completed by The Leapfrog Group because the facilities are considered specialty hospitals.
“Safe, quality care is always our priority, and it was particularly important this year as we faced the biggest public health crisis of our lifetimes,” Ken Mitchell, M.D., chief medical officer of St. David’s HealthCare, said. “We are incredibly grateful to all of the frontline workers who provided exceptional care to our community, especially during this critical time of need.”
Developed under the guidance of a national expert panel, the Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade uses up to 27 measures of publicly available hospital safety data to assign grades to more than 2,700 U.S. acute-care hospitals twice per year. The Hospital Safety Grade’s methodology is peer-reviewed and fully transparent, and the results are free to the public.