Guadalupe Regional Medical Center (GRMC) announced that it has been recognized for two distinctions in quality excellence from Healthgrades: the Healthgrades 2018 Patient Safety Excellence Award™ for the second year in a row and the Healthgrades 2018 Outstanding Patient Experience Award™. Healthgrades is the leading online resource for comprehensive information about physicians and hospitals.

Only 65 out of just over 4,500 hospitals evaluated for patient safety and patient experience excellence achieved both distinctions. This places GRMC within the top 2 percent of eligible hospitals in the nation to receive both awards. This distinction recognizes Guadalupe Regional Medical Center for excellent performance in safeguarding patients from serious, potentially preventable complications, as well as providing a positive experience for patients during their hospital stays.

Patient Safety
During the study period (2014 to 2016), Healthgrades 2018 Patient Safety Excellence Award recipient hospitals demonstrated excellent performance in safety provided to patients in the Medicare population, as measured by objective outcomes for 13 patient safety indicators defined by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). This distinction places GRMC among the top 10 percent of all short-term acute care hospitals in the nation to receive this recognition.

“This national recognition from Healthgrades, for the second consecutive year, confirms our testament to the high standard of care provided to patients every day by the staff at GRMC and to our dedication in providing high-quality, safe care to every life we are privileged to touch”, said Rhonda Unruh, VP of Quality for Guadalupe Regional Medical Center.

If all hospitals achieved the average performance of award recipients for each of the 13 Patient Safety Indicators evaluated, during the 2014 to 2016 study period, 126,342 patient safety events could have been avoided.

In addition, during this study period, patients treated in hospitals receiving Healthgrades Patient Safety Excellence Award were, on average:

• 55.6 percent less likely to experience an accidental cut, puncture, perforation or hemorrhage during medical care, than patients treated at non-recipient hospitals
• 52.4 percent less likely to experience a collapsed lung due to a procedure or surgery in or around the chest, than patients treated at non-recipient hospitals
• 62.8 percent less likely to experience catheter-related bloodstream infections acquired at the hospital, than patients treated at non-recipient hospitals
• 54.3 percent less likely to experience pressure sores or bed sores acquired in the hospital, than patients treated at non-recipient hospitals1

“Healthgrades congratulates the recipient hospitals on their successes, in both providing outstanding care to their patients and for reducing patient safety events,” said Brad Bowman, MD, Chief Medical Officer at Healthgrades. “Distinctions like these are important to consumers as they determine where to receive care.”

Patient Experience
In addition to being recognized as one of Healthgrades 2018 Patient Safety Excellence Award recipients, GRMC also out-performed peer hospitals in patient experience. Guadalupe Regional Medical Center is among the top 10 percent of hospitals nationwide for patient experience and has received the 2018 Outstanding Patient Experience Award.

“At GRMC, we approach each patient interaction with the goal of meeting and exceeding their expectations”, said Elizabeth Pastrano, Patient Experience Coordinator at Guadalupe Regional Medical Center. “Every positive encounter that a patient has during their stay is a direct result of our team’s commitment to providing quality healthcare to each patient we are have the privilege to care for”.

Healthgrades evaluated performance by applying a scoring methodology to 10 patient experience measures, using data collected from a 32-question patient experience survey of the hospital’s own patients. The survey questions focus on patients’ perspectives of their care in the hospital. The topics of these questions ranged from cleanliness and noise levels in patient rooms to factors such as pain management and responsiveness to patients’ needs. The measures also include whether a patient would recommend the hospital to friends or family.

“Patient experience surveys offer important insights about hospitals and their commitment to providing patients with outstanding experience, and furthermore, consumers value that information when making care decisions,” said Brad Bowman, MD, Chief Medical Officer, Healthgrades. “Hospitals that have received the Healthgrades 2018 Outstanding Patient Experience Award have received high marks from their most important stakeholders—the patients themselves.”

1 Statistics are based on Healthgrades Patient Safety Ratings and Excellence Award methodology, which is primarily constructed using AHRQ Technical Specifications version 5E applied to MedPAR data for years 2014 through 2016 and represent three-year estimates for Medicare patients only.