The number of "top performer" Joint Commission-accredited hospitals increased 77 percent from last year to 1,099 organizations, according to the accreditor.
The Joint Commission announced in its annual quality and safety report that 424 hospitals claimed the honor two years in a row, while 182 achieved it for three consecutive years. The accreditor designated a hospital as a top performer based on accountability measures for heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, surgical care, children's asthma care, inpatient psychiatric services, venous thromboembolism care, stroke care and immunization.
Top performing hospitals must provide information on four measure sets, achieve a 95 percent performance or above for all reported accountability measures and score a 95 percent or above in all of the reported accountability measures with at least 30 cases.
"More than half of Joint Commission-accredited hospitals have reached or have nearly reached top performer distinction, showing that we are approaching a time in which consistent excellence in hospital performance on these important quality measures is the new normal," said Mark R. Chassin, M.D., president and CEO of The Joint Commission. "This means patients are getting better care thanks to the shared commitment by hospitals to using data and proven quality improvement methods to always do the right thing and improve quality and safety."
The report also shows that hospitals have signicantly improved the quality of care provided to heart attack, pneumonia, surgical care, children's asthma care, inpatient psychiatric, VTE, and stroke patients, according to composite accountability measure results.
However, next year the accreditor will raise the bar for top performing hospitals by increasing the number of selected core measures they report from four to six. The Joint Commission hopes the list will encourage better quality care among accredited hospitals, FierceHealthcare previously reported.
To learn more:
- read the announcement
- check out the top performing hospitals in the report (pdf.)
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