Baptist Hospital East named among the nation's Top 100 Performance Improvement leaders

Baptist Hospital East recently was named one of the nation's top performance improvement leader hospitals by Evanston, Ill.-based Solucient®.

Baptist East and its senior management team were recognized for being one of 100 hospitals making the greatest progress in improving hospital-wide performance over five years (2000-2004). These organizations have set national benchmarks for consistent improvement in clinical outcomes, safety, hospital efficiency, financial stability and growth.

Findings from the third edition of Solucient's 100 Top Hospitals®: Performance Improvement Leaders study appeared in the May 1, 2006 issue of Modern Healthcare magazine. “At Baptist East, we’ve never been satisfied to rest on our laurels, and this type of recognition doesn’t happen without a tremendous amount of effort,” said President Sue Stout Tamme. “This award is a direct reflection of the teamwork between our medical staff and our clinicians, who continuously work to see that our patients receive not just good care, but some of the best that’s available.”

Baptist Hospital East was the only Louisville hospital named to the study, and one of only 20 large community hospitals in the nation selected.

"Five years of steady, well-aligned improvement means that these 100 Performance Improvement (PI) Leaders have enormously increased the value they provide to their communities," said Jean Chenoweth, senior vice president, performance improvement & 100 Top programs, Center for Healthcare Improvement at Solucient.

Facilities recognized on the PI Leader list are represented across five hospital classes:

• Major Teaching (15)
• Teaching (25)
• Large Community, 250+ beds (20)
• Medium Community, 100 to 249 beds (20)
• Small Community, 25 to 99 beds (20)

The study looked at all U.S. hospitals licensed to treat Medicare patients. Nine performance measures were examined at each hospital: risk-adjusted mortality and complications, average length of stay, expenses, profitability, cash-to-debt ratio, growth in patient volume, tangible assets, and risk-adjusted patient safety index. The study used publicly available Medicare cost reports, MedPAR data, and CMS outpatient data from 2000 – 2004.

Earlier this year, Baptist Hospital East was named one of the nation’s 100 Top Hospitals for the second consecutive year (Solucient’s 100 Top Hospitals: National Benchmarks for Success) and was ranked the number one hospital in Kentucky’s Best Places to Work designation by the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce and the Kentucky Society for Human Resources Management.

More information on this study and other 100 Top Hospitals research is available at www.100tophospitals.com.