Massachusetts Hospitals Ace Safety Ratings Exam

Beth Israel Deaconness Medical Center, Boston Medical Center, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital images provided

Ask any resident of Massachusetts, especially in the Boston area, and they’ll say the Commonwealth has the best of everything. We’re full of city-wide and state-wide pride, and it extends from our sports teams to our hospitals.

Leapfrog Group, a nonprofit rating group, recently completed its bi-annual examination of the safety of hospitals nationwide and Massachusetts’s report card came in with more “A” grades than any other state in the country except Maine. No hospitals in the state received a “D” or “F.”

Beth Israel Deaconness Medical Center, Boston Medical Center, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital all received “A”s in both the Spring and the Fall 2013 examinations. Massachusetts General Hospital received a “B”s in both exams, and Tufts Medical Center received an “A” in the spring and a “B” in the fall.

No hospitals in the city received a “C”. A comprehensive list of all of the grades in the states and further details can be found here.

Even though Massachusetts fell behind Maine on the national list, with its 48 hospitals to Maine’s 16, 76 percent of Massachusetts hospitals received a top grade.

The overall nationwide report showed an increase in safety across the board, but the Massachusetts Hospital Association thinks there is still more to do. In a statement, the MHA said:

“Public reporting of hospital quality and patient safety information inspires hospitals to continue to work hard to improve, and patient care quality and safety are getting better because of reporting efforts…[While] these reports can be valuable, the sheer number of reports and variation among them can also be confusing to individuals and the public. To address these challenges, we suggest that interested organizations such as the Leapfrog Group collaborate on a common national framework for reporting on the quality and safety of healthcare rather than issuing sporadic, singular reports that differ in source data and methodology.”

Massachusetts, and the Boston area in particular, has yet another reason to brag thanks to Leapfrog. And in the future, if Leapfrog and like-minded ratings companies take the MHA’s advice, Massachusetts will undoubtedly come out on top once again in a more complete and comprehensive report.