GOLDEN, CO – Patient outcomes at each of the nation’s 5,000 non-federal hospitals indicate a wide gap in quality between the best hospitals and all others.

According to a study by HealthGrades, an independent healthcare ratings organization, patients at highly rated hospitals have a 52 percent better chance of surviving compared with the U.S. hospital average.

The 12th annual "HealthGrades Hospital Quality in America Study" examined nearly 40 million Medicare hospitalization records from 2006-08. The study looks at trends in mortality and complication rates and is designed to provide the foundation for quality ratings of procedures and diagnoses at each hospital.

“With Washington focused on rewarding high-quality hospitals and empowering patients to make more informed healthcare choices, this information comes at a turning point in the healthcare debate,” said Rick May, MD, an author of the HealthGrades study.

The study found that hospitals certified as a Center of Excellence in Stroke Care by The Joint Commission had an 8 percent lower risk-adjusted mortality rate than non-certified hospitals.

Sites like HealthGrades.com provide information needed to choose a high-quality hospital, said May, while HealthGrades’ hospital ratings provide benchmarking data that can help hospitals improve their clinical quality levels.

Across all procedures in which complications were studied, there was a 79.69 percent lower chance of experiencing one or more in-hospital complications in a 5-star-rated hospital compared to a 1-star-rated hospital.
Memorial University Medical Center in Savannah, Ga., is one of those 5-star-rated hospitals.

“We have always been committed to providing the highest level of care. That’s what our patients expect and deserve,” said Phillip Schaengold, president and CEO of Memorial University Medical Center.

Over the last three studies, Ohio and Florida consistently have had the greatest percentage of hospitals in the top 15 percent for risk-adjusted mortality.

Kettering Medical Center in Kettering, Ohio, was one of those high-performing Ohio hospitals. It ranked sixth in the nation for the treatment of stroke.

“This independent assessment of our quality is very significant because it is based on Medicare’s national database and it charts performance for an extended period of time,” said Roy Chew, president of Kettering Medical Center.

The HealthGrades study discovered that, across all 17 procedures and diagnoses in which mortality was studied, there was an approximate 71.64 percent lower chance of dying in a 5-star-rated hospital compared to a 1-star-rated hospital.

According to May, if all hospitals performed at the level of a 5-star-rated hospital across the 17 procedures and diagnoses studied, 224,537 Medicare lives could potentially have been saved from 2006 through 2008.