UW Hospital gets coveted five-star rating

For the second year in a row, UW Hospital and Clinics has been named one of the 10 top-performing academic hospitals in the United States, based on a national quality and accountability benchmarking study by the University Health System Consortium, an alliance of U.S. academic health centers and their affiliated hospitals.

The study focused on measuring quality and safe patient care at the 81 UHC member organizations, each of which was rated in four key areas:

• Safety: based on 15 nationally recognized patient safety indicators and procedures
• Mortality: comparing the actual rate to the rate that would be expected based on severity of patient illness
• Effectiveness: performance on national hospital-quality measures established by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations and other indicators such as surgical readmission rates
• Equity: based on disparities in outcomes related to race, gender or ability to pay

Based on the benchmark scoring, UW Hospital and Clinics was one of 10 hospitals to receive a five-star rating. Others included the Mayo Clinic, Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. The hospital ranked well in each of the four key areas, and was the top performer in both Equity and in Patient Centeredness, a category that was measured in the benchmark but not factored into the composite performance rating.

“We’re justifiably proud that the work we’re doing to become the safest hospital in the country is being recognized by our peers,” says Donna Sollenberger, chief executive officer of UW Hospital and Clinics.

The UHC study used a scoring matrix to evaluate specific quality and safety outcomes at each hospital, assigning each institution a numerical percentage score. Surveyors found that hospitals with strong leadership, a focus on service excellence, and a collaborative partnership among physicians, nurses and other care providers scored top marks.