Leapfrog gives nearly a third of Georgia’s hospitals ‘A’ for patient safety

The Leapfrog Group recently released its spring 2021 grades on patient safety, and 24 Georgia hospitals got an “A.”

The Leapfrog Group is a national advocacy organization of employers and other purchasers focused on health care safety and quality. Its hospital safety grades — which twice a year assign an “A”-”F” to more than 2,700 general acute care hospitals in the U.S. — focuses on a hospital’s “ability to protect patients from preventable errors, accidents, injuries and infections,” the group stated in a press release.

“When we talk about patient safety, we’re really talking about how hospitals and other health care organizations protect their patients from errors, injuries, accidents, and infections,” the report states. “While many hospitals are good at keeping their patients safe, some hospitals aren’t. Upwards of 250,000 people die every year from preventable errors in hospitals.”

To determine each grade, Leapfrog used 27 national performance measures from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, its own hospital survey and information from other supplemental data sources. The methodology has been peer-reviewed and published in the Journal of Patient Safety.

Of the 76 Georgia hospitals receiving a grade, 24 got an “A,” 19 got a “B,” 30 got a “C,” and three were graded “D.” Hospitals are listed alphabetically by grade. Eight of the 24 “A” hospitals are part of the Piedmont system.

Hospitals with an “A” grade are:

Cartersville Medical Center in Cartersville

Coliseum Medical Centers in Macon

Coliseum Northside Hospital in Macon

Colquitt Regional Medical Center in Moultrie

Doctors Hospital of Augusta in Augusta

Emory St. Joseph’s Hospital in Atlanta

Fairview Park Hospital in Dublin

Memorial Satilla Health in Waycross

Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital in Albany

Piedmont Athens Regional Medical Center in Athens

Piedmont Columbus Regional Northside in Columbus

Piedmont Fayette Hospital in Fayetteville

Piedmont Henry Hospital in Stockbridge

Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta

Piedmont Mountainside Hospital in Jasper

Piedmont Newnan Hospital in Newnan

Piedmont Newton Hospital in Covington

Redmond Regional Medical Center in Rome

St. Mary’s Sacred Heart Hospital in Lavonia

Tanner Medical Center of Carrollton in Carrolton

University Hospital in Augusta

Upson Regional Medical Center in Thomaston

Wellstar Douglas Hospital in Douglasville

Wellstar Paulding Hospital in Hiram

The performance measures serve as a proxy for the safety of care provided to COVID-19 patients in many ways. For example, Leapfrog wrote, a hospital with infection control procedures in place is better equipped to protect patients and health care workers.

“This pandemic emphasized how much we rely on America’s health care workforce,” said Leah Binder, president and CEO of the Leapfrog Group. “Our straight ‘A’ hospitals remind us how preparedness protected their patients as well as their workforce and created a high level of organizational resilience. As we emerge from the pandemic, hospitals need to double down on safety, so they save lives, strengthen their organizations, and position themselves to withstand the next crisis. Putting safety first should be the priority of every hospital CEO.”

Across all states, highlights include:

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