Joint Commission recognizes UF Health Shands Hospital for achieving quality measures

University of Florida Health Shands Hospital has been recognized as a 2013 Top Performer on Key Quality Measures by the Joint Commission.

The hospital has been recognized as part of The Joint Commission’s 2014 annual report for achieving certain best practice scores in the areas of heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia and surgical care.

“This recognition as a Top Performer represents the commitment to positive patient outcomes and evidence-based processes made by staff all across our organization,” said David S. Guzick, M.D., Ph.D., UF senior vice president for health affairs and president of UF Health. “We understand that what matters most is the quality and safety of the care we provide, and we constantly endeavor to improve that care for the patients in our community.”

The Joint Commission is an independent, not-for-profit organization that accredits and certifies more than 20,500 health care organizations and programs in the United States.

“We’re just incredibly proud of our caregivers for achieving this,” said Randy Harmatz, the senior vice president and chief quality officer for UF Health Shands Hospital. “We’re working to ensure that the right thing is the easy thing to do — and that the right care is delivered every time.”

Inclusion on the Top Performer list is based on reported data from the previous calendar year. Therefore, Top Performer hospitals announced in 2014 are selected based on data that was reported for 2013. For 2013, the total number of Joint Commission-accredited hospitals achieving Top Performer recognition increased by 11 percent from the previous year, with 1,224 receiving recognition.

“Faculty, residents, nurses and staff have worked hard to be sure patients receive appropriate care that improves outcomes,” said Timothy Flynn, M.D., senior associate dean for clinical affairs in the UF College of Medicine and chief medical officer for UF Health Shands Hospital. “Such multidisciplinary care efforts are the strength of an academic medical center like UF Health. Our teams will continue to provide the best care available to those who come to us for help.”

The Joint Commission launched the Top Performer program in September 2011. It recognizes hospitals that achieve and sustain certain quality measures. This recognition is “designed to identify measures that produce the greatest positive impact on patient outcomes when hospitals demonstrate improvement,” according to The Joint Commission website.

Top Performer hospitals must demonstrate improved performance on evidence-based interventions that increase the chances of healthy outcomes for patients with certain conditions, including heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, surgical care, children’s asthma, stroke, venous thromboembolism and perinatal care, as well as for inpatient psychiatric services and immunizations.

Specifically, the designated hospitals must: achieve cumulative performance of 95 percent or above across all reported accountability measures; achieve performance of 95 percent or above on each and every reported accountability measure where there are at least 30 cases; and have at least one core measure set that has a composite rate of 95 percent or above, and within that set all applicable individual accountability measures have a performance rate of 95 percent or above.

A 95 percent score means UF Health Shands Hospital and other Top Performers performed an evidence-based practice such as giving aspirin at arrival for heart attack patients or giving antibiotics one hour before surgery in at least 95 of every 100 opportunities.

“We’re trying to constantly put these best practices in context of patient safety and quality,” said Harmatz. “It’s about improving the entire model of care for our patients, not just trying to meet measures.”

This latest recognition comes a month after UF Health Shands Hospital received the highest grade for patient safety from The Leapfrog Group, a national nonprofit organization that assesses publicly reported safety data, for a third consecutive term.