St. Alexius Only ND Hospital to be Cited for Quality
St. Alexius Medical Center is the only hospital in ND to have been awarded the HealthGrades® 2004 Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence.™ HealthGrades is a healthcare-quality ratings, information and advisory services company, based in Lakewood, CO, whose clients include healthcare providers, employers, health plans, insurance companies and consumers.
HealthGrades analyzes the quality of care at more than 4,700 hospitals across the country each year and publishes ratings based on the performance of that hospital. Hospitals are awarded a 5 star (best), 3 star (average), or 1 star (poor) rating. Each year, HealthGrades offers the Distinguished Hospital recognition to an elite group of hospitals that achieve notably high levels of performance across service lines that include cardiac, stroke, orthopedic, pulmonary/respiratory, vascular and gastrointestinal procedures.
This is an important distinction for St. Alexius Medical Center, as a recent survey of consumers conducted by HealthGrades® shows that 40% of consumers consider a hospital’s quality ratings in making their hospital choice.
In addition, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which is the agency that reimburses hospitals for Medicare patients, will begin in 2005 to base reimbursement levels on clinical outcomes to ensure high quality care for Medicare beneficiaries.
The Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence is the first hospital award to focus purely on hospitals clinical quality and is designed to highlight the best hospitals in the nation. HealthGrades bases the awards on a detailed study of each hospital’s Medicare risk-adjusted mortality and complication rates, as reported to the federal government. HealthGrades found a substantial difference in clinical quality between Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence winners and all other hospitals.
HealthGrades established this award not only to highlight hospitals that provide high quality care, but also to encourage consumers to research the quality of their local hospital before seeking care.
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