HCA Healthcare Exceeds National Average for Patient Safety Grades

HCA Healthcare, Inc. (NYSE:HCA), one of the nation’s leading healthcare providers, today announced that 81% of its facilities earned an “A” or “B” in the fall 2022 Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade. This is 24 percentage points higher than the national average of 57%.

Twice a year, The Leapfrog Group assigns an “A,” “B,” “C,” “D” or “F” Safety Grade to general hospitals across the country based on how well they protect patients from preventable medical errors, accidents, injuries and infections. The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade utilizes national patient safety measures from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Leapfrog Hospital Survey to make their assessment.

“We are proud of this accomplishment and of the culture of safety HCA Healthcare continues to foster across our organization,” said Karla Miller, chief patient safety officer at HCA Healthcare. “We could not have achieved this without our extraordinary physicians, nurses and critical support staff members who dedicate themselves to protecting each patient who walks through the doors of an HCA Healthcare facility.”

Eighty-two HCA Healthcare hospitals earned an “A.” Rose Medical Center in Denver, Colorado and St. David’s Medical Center in Austin, Texas received a “Straight A” designation for achieving an “A” grade in every update of the Hospital Safety Grade. They are among the 22 hospitals nationwide to achieve the “Straight A” designation since the ratings began in 2012.

HCA Healthcare has a long history of prioritizing and working to continually improve patient safety, including:

• Establishing a Patient Safety Organization (PSO) to improve patient safety and the quality of healthcare delivery by partnering with colleagues at HCA Healthcare facilities to build systems, refine processes and foster a culture of safety.
• Developing evidence-based perinatal protocols through the company’s longstanding partnership with March of Dimes, such as prohibiting elective delivery prior to 39 weeks to help babies have a healthy start to life. This best practice has now been adopted worldwide as a standard of care. HCA Healthcare has also worked to identify and develop solutions for top perinatal safety risks including preeclampsia, deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism (PE) in C-Section deliveries, and post-partum hemorrhage.
• Hosting the REDUCE MRSA study, with nearly 75,000 patients across 43 HCA Healthcare hospitals, which found that using antimicrobial soap and ointment to decolonize all ICU patients reduced bloodstream infections by 44% and MRSA by 37%. The CDC has since adopted this practice.
• Conducting the ABATE Infection Trial at 53 HCA Healthcare hospitals with 330,000 patients in 194 non-ICU units, which found an infection control technique achieved a 31% reduction in bloodstream infections and nearly a 40% reduction in antibiotic-resistant bacteria among non-ICU patients with central line catheters and lumbar drains.
• Developing the Sepsis Prediction and Optimization of Therapy (SPOT) tool, a system to help clinicians more quickly identify patients with sepsis.
• Building upon the capabilities of SPOT technology to develop the Next-gen Analytics for Treatment and Efficiency (NATE) platform during the COVID-19 pandemic. NATE brings analytic insights to assist clinicians in applying the appropriate clinical protocol for mechanically ventilated patients. This ability helped to decrease length of stay and increase survival in HCA Healthcare facilities by 28%.
• Reducing HCA Healthcare’s average door-to-needle-time to 34 minutes, faster than the national standard for stroke care.

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