News: Leapfrog Group names top hospitals of 2018

Florida, California, New Jersey and Texas had strong showings in The Leapfrog Group’s 2018 Top Hospitals list, with 13 or more hospitals in each of those three states earning the distinction.

Of the 118 Top Hospitals recognized in 23 states and the District of Columbia, 13 were children’s hospitals, 35 were general hospitals, 53 were teaching hospitals and 17 were rural hospitals, Patient Safety and Quality Healthcare (PSQH) reported. Only one hospital in New York made the list, PSQH reported.

“We’re encouraged by the hard work of Top Hospitals, as well as all of the hospitals that compete for this award,” said Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. “Their transparency and determination delivers the best possible care in their communities.”

The award is based on several quality metrics, including:

• Preventing infections
• Reducing C-sections
• Use of technology to ensure safer care
• Leadership policies and practices

In addition, The Leapfrog Hospital Survey compares hospitals’ performance on national standards of patient safety, quality, efficiency, and management structures that prevent errors, which The Leapfrog Group says provides a comprehensive picture of how patients fare at individual hospitals.

Leapfrog’s Top Hospitals are not listed by rank, unlike other popular hospital rankings such as U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals rankings. In fact, top hospitals on one list are often not found on the other, owing largely to the use of different metrics. For example, the Mayo Clinic, which topped the U.S. News & World Report list, did not appear on the Leapfrog list.

Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in PSQH. To read the full Leapfrog list, click here. To read about the U.S. News & World Report list, click here. To read about CDI’s role with publicly reported data, click here.