Long Beach Memorial Awarded an A for Patient Safety by Hospital Safety Score

Long Beach Memorial was honored with an “A” Hospital Safety ScoreSM by The Leapfrog Group, an independent national nonprofit run by employers and other large purchasers of health benefits. The Hospital Safety ScoreSM was calculated under the guidance of The Leapfrog Group’s Blue Ribbon Expert Panel using publicly available data on patient injuries, medical and medication errors, and infections. U.S. hospitals were assigned an A, B, C, D, or F for their safety.

“Long Beach Memorial is committed to providing the highest level of quality care and patient safety to each and every person we treat,” said Donna Hartman, Vice President, Clinical Quality & Patient Safety, Long Beach Memorial. “Quality improvement is an on-going, continuous process and we plan to continue to work alongside our patients and community to continue to improve our high standard of care for all.”

“It’s The Leapfrog Group’s goal to give patients the information they need and deserve before even entering a hospital,” said Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. “We congratulate the hospitals that earned an ‘A’ and we look forward to the day when all hospitals in the U.S. will earn the highest scores for putting patient safety first.”

To see Long Beach Memorial’s scores as they compare nationally and locally, visit www.hospitalsafetyscore.org, the Hospital Safety ScoreSM website, which also provides information on how the public can protect themselves and loved ones during a hospital stay.

Calculated under the guidance of The Leapfrog Group’s nine-member Blue Ribbon Expert Panel, the Hospital Safety Score uses 26 measures of publicly available hospital safety data to produce a single score representing a hospital’s overall capacity to keep patients safe from infections, injuries, and medical and medication errors. The panel includes: John Birkmeyer (University of Michigan), Ashish Jha (Harvard University), Lucian Leape (Harvard University), Arnold Millstein (Stanford University), Peter Pronovost (Johns Hopkins University), Patrick Romano (University of California, Davis), Sara Singer (Harvard University), Tim Vogus (Vanderbilt University), and Robert Wachter (University of California, San Francisco).

About The Leapfrog Group:
The Leapfrog Group (www.leapfroggroup.org) is a national organization using the collective leverage of large purchasers of health care to initiate breakthrough improvements in the safety, quality, and affordability of health care for Americans. The flagship Leapfrog Hospital Survey allows purchasers to structure their contracts and purchasing to reward the highest performing hospitals. The Leapfrog Group was founded in November 2000 with support from the Business Roundtable and national funders, and is now independently operated with support from its purchaser and other members.

About Long Beach Memorial:
Named among the top 12 hospitals in the Los Angeles Metro area by U.S. News and World Report, Long Beach Memorial has been providing compassionate care with the latest state-of-the-art technology for more than 100 years. Long Beach Memorial is the region's first choice for comprehensive care in virtually every medical and surgical specialty. Long Beach Memorial is a leader in new technology, being one of only three hospitals in Calif. with a 320 Slice CT Scanner and preventative technology and programs such as the Electromagnetic Navigation Bronchoscope (ENB™) and the Division of Interventional Neuroradiology. Centers of Excellence include the MemorialCare Heart and Vascular Institute, the MemorialCare Todd Cancer Institute, the MemorialCare Rehabilitation Institute, the MemorialCare Orthopedic Institute, the MemorialCare Neuroscience Institute, MemorialCare Joint Replacement Center, Stroke Program and the Emergency Department and Trauma Center. Visit MemorialCare.org/Long_Beach, like us on Facebook.com/LongBeachMemorial and follow us at Twitter.com/LongBeachMMC.