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Leapfrog Group Launches Improved Web Site With New Safety and Quality Information on Hospitals Nationwide

Saturday, August 2, 2008 General News
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WASHINGTON, Aug. 1 Hospitals across the country have submitted updated patient safety information to the nonprofit Leapfrog Group, which has posted the information on a free, new, easy to use Web site at www.leapfroggroup.org. Thus far, 1,169 hospitals have submitted answers to important questions about quality that consumers can use to compare hospitals.
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"Leapfrog's Web site is a premier resource for helping consumers pick the safest, highest quality hospitals," said Leah Binder, MA, Leapfrog Group CEO. "The redesigned site makes it easy for families to see which hospitals have the best track records treating certain conditions and which are the most committed to preventing dangerous errors."
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The Leapfrog Hospital Survey asks:



-- Does the hospital use the best known methods to prevent medical errors?



-- What are the odds of dying at a hospital as a result of undergoing certain high-risk surgeries there?



-- How efficient is the hospital in performing certain procedures?



-- Are medication orders handled electronically, which is known to be the best method to prevent medication errors? And if the hospital has a computerized system, is it effective?



-- How well does the hospital perform seven high-risk procedures* and care for high-risk deliveries? (*Coronary artery bypass graft, percutaneous coronary intervention, abdominal aortic aneurysm repair, aortic valve replacement, pancreatic resection, esophagectomy, bariatric surgery.)



-- Is the hospital's intensive care unit (ICU) staffed by qualified specialists?



-- How prevalent are hospital acquired conditions such as bed sores, falls and burns?



-- Does the hospital have a policy that includes not billing for "never events" (e.g., surgery on the wrong limb or serious injury from a contaminated drug) and apologizing to anyone affected by them?



"For the first time ever, in addition to seeing how well a hospital performs certain procedures, consumers can know how efficiently they perform them. Costs at a hospital that provides both high quality and high value may likely be lower than at others," said Binder.



The website shows individual hospital results. Analyses of Survey results that show how hospitals are faring on these measures as a group are forthcoming over the next few months. Leapfrog will release the list of Leapfrog Top Hospitals in September.



Leapfrog Hospital Survey results are freely available, updated monthly and are the most current available. Results are used by consumers and by business coalitions in 37 major US markets to make purchasing decisions. Since 2001, hospitals representing over half of all US hospital beds have been participating in this voluntary survey; it covers 16 of the 30 National Quality Forum's Safe Practices for Better Healthcare.



The Leapfrog Group

On behalf of the millions of Americans for whom many of the nation's largest corporations and public agencies buy health benefits, The Leapfrog Group (www.leapfroggroup.org) aims to use its members' collective leverage to initiate breakthrough improvements in the safety, quality, and affordability of health care. Since 2000, when it was founded by the Business Roundtable, Leapfrog has played a leading role in the movement to advance value-based health care purchasing.





SOURCE The Leapfrog Group
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