Awarded Straight A's For Safety From Leapfrog

Once again Carteret Health Care has been awarded an “A” by a national ratings program, The Leapfrog Group. An announcement by the group shows Carteret Health Care received its fifth straight “A” top ranking for safety. Carteret’s Hospital Safety Grade is 3.35 in the latest release for hospitals across the country and the highest grade awarded to hospitals for keeping patients safe from errors, injuries, accidents and infections.

“Our staff has embedded patient safety and satisfaction into all we do at Carteret Health Care and this award validates those efforts,” said Carteret Health Care CEO Dick Brvenik. “Patients can be confident in knowing that the culture here is to always put our patients first in everything we do, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and year after year.”

Only 32% of hospitals in the nation were recognized with an A Safety Grade this fall. Carteret Health Care’s 3.35 grade is well above the minimum A normalized Hospital Safety Grade of 3.159 as indicated by The Leapfrog Group. Using 30 evidence-based measures of patient safety, The Leapfrog Group calculated a numerical grade for all eligible hospitals in the US. The numerical grade was then converted in to one of five letter grades from A to F with A representing the best Hospital Safety Grade.

For Carteret Health Care, this comes after other achievements such as being recognized as the only North Carolina Top 100 Rural & Community Hospital by iVantage Health Analytics and for receiving the most Get With The Guideline awards of any North Carolina hospital for heart failure, stroke, atrial fibrillation and resuscitation care. Equally notable announcements include being 1 of only 13 NC hospitals recognized as a 2017 Most Wired Organization and care excellence awards by The Joint Commission for Hospital Accreditation for stroke and joint procedures.

The Leapfrog Group is a not for profit organization that provides free information for the benefit of the public on hospital compliance with process measures, structural measures and outcome measures to help patients make best choices in selecting hospitals. The report uses some readily available data such as the CMS core measures, data from the American Hospital Association, and the Leapfrog Group’s own surveys.

Dr. Donald Pocock, Vice President of Medical Affairs added, “Our consecutive top Leapfrog record speaks to the quality, safety and innovation of the care at Carteret Health Care. We are honored to be recognized for this continued dedication of every physician and staff member."

The Leapfrog Group website was updated on October 31 with these new Safety Grades. The community is encouraged to visit the website at www.hospitalsafetyGrade.org to review this fully transparent information in greater detail.

Brvenik concluded, “Our patients truly benefit when we put quality and safety at the forefront of everything we do.”