Austin, TX – All eligible St. David’s HealthCare facilities were recently awarded an “A” from The Leapfrog Group’s Spring 2020 Hospital Safety Grades. The designation recognizes hospitals’ efforts to protect patients from harm and provide safer healthcare. 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 one of only two hospitals 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.
“As we’ve witnessed firsthand while on the frontlines of the biggest public health emergency of our lifetimes, patient safety is critically important to achieving optimal outcomes,” Ken Mitchell, M.D., chief medical officer of St. David’s HealthCare, said. “We appreciate and applaud the extraordinary dedication of our doctors, nurses and staff who helped earn this recognition, especially during this critical time of need.”
Developed under the guidance of a national expert panel, the Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade uses up to 28 measures of publicly available hospital safety data to assign grades to more than 2,600 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.
For more information about the Hospital Safety Grades, visit the Hospital Safety Grades website.
The Leapfrog Group
Founded in 2000 by large employers and other purchasers, The Leapfrog Group is a national nonprofit organization driving a movement for giant leaps forward in the quality and safety of American healthcare. The flagship Leapfrog Hospital Survey and new Leapfrog Ambulatory Surgery Center (ASC) Survey collect and transparently report hospital and ASC performance, empowering purchasers to find the highest-value care and giving consumers the lifesaving information they need to make informed decisions. The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade, Leapfrog’s other main initiative, assigns letter grades to hospitals based on their record of patient safety, helping consumers protect themselves and their families from errors, injuries, accidents and infections.