Leapfrog Group hospital safety grades highlight decline in patient experience
The pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic have hampered progress on the patient safety front, though most hospitals received passing grades.
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The Leapfrog Group, a national watchdog organization of employers and other purchasers focused on healthcare safety, released the spring 2022 Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade today, finding an overall decline in patient safety measures the report considers "significant."
Recent studies have shown that the pandemic has hampered years of progress on patient safety efforts. The updated data included in the Safety Grade, some of which reflects a pandemic-era time frame, heightens these findings, and demonstrates how patient care worsened due to strains on the healthcare system and workforce.
The updated Hospital Safety Grades are published alongside a new report, "Patient Experience During the Pandemic: Adult Inpatient Care," which provides further insight into how the patient experience has declined between the pre-pandemic and mid-pandemic eras.
Included in the 30-plus measures of patient safety used to calculate the grades are five measures of patient experience that research has shown have a direct tie to patient safety outcomes. For example, enhanced communication with providers about medications can lead to lower rates of hospital-acquired conditions like sepsis and blood clots, fewer surgical complications and decreases in the incidence of respiratory failure.
The decline in patient safety was attributed mainly to the pressure on the healthcare workforce brought by the COVID-19 pandemic, with authors recommending a re-commitment to communication and responsiveness for hospitals and health systems.
The Safety Grade assigns a letter grade to nearly 3,000 U.S. general hospitals based on more than 30 measures of patient safety. The rating is solely focused on a hospital's ability to protect patients from preventable errors, accidents, injuries and infections.
WHAT'S THE IMPACT?
At HospitalSafetyGrade.org, the public can find detailed information about a hospital's performance on patient experience and other safety measures used to grade hospitals.
Across all states, 33% of hospitals received an "A," 24% received a "B," 36% received a "C," 7% received a "D" and fewer than 1% received an "F."
The five states with the highest percentages of "A" hospitals are North Carolina, Virginia, Utah, Colorado and Michigan. There were no "A" hospitals in Wyoming; West Virginia; Washington, D.C.; or North Dakota.
Despite the general decrease in patient experience ratings, there was still significant variation in safety performance across U.S. hospitals, though most received a "C" or higher.
The grading system is fully transparent and free to the public. Grades are updated biannually in the fall and in the spring.
THE LARGER TREND
The Leapfrog Group is a national nonprofit organization founded in 2000 by large employers and other purchasers. The flagship Leapfrog Hospital Survey and new Leapfrog Ambulatory Surgery Center Survey collect and report hospital and ASC performance.
The Hospital Safety Grade, Leapfrog's other main initiative, assigns letter grades to hospitals based on their record of patient safety, with the goal of helping consumers protect themselves and their families from errors, injuries, accidents and infections.
ON THE RECORD
"The healthcare workforce has faced unprecedented levels of pressure during the pandemic, and as a result, patients' experience with their care appears to have suffered," said Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. "We commend the workforce for their heroic efforts these past few years and now strongly urge hospital leadership to recommit to improved care – from communication to responsiveness – and get back on track with patient safety outcomes."
Twitter: @JELagasse
Email the writer: jeff.lagasse@himssmedia.com
