VHHA Debuts Quality and Patient Safety Scorecards

October 14, 2015

Virginia Hospital & Healthcare Association Debuts Quality and Patient Safety Scorecards Interactive Online Tool Provides Access to Hospital-Specific Quality and Patient Safety Report Cards

RICHMOND, VA – Virginia’s local hospitals and health systems are committed to providing the highest quality care and service to all they serve. One aspect of fulfilling that mission is a focus on constant evaluation and assessment to identify opportunities for improvement. To that end, the Virginia Hospital & Healthcare Association (VHHA) recently unveiled its Quality & Patient Safety Scorecard – an interactive, online tool that enables users to review data showing hospital-specific performance on key quality, safety, and patient satisfaction measures. The scorecards have been developed at the behest of VHHA’s Board of Directors, which is comprised of leaders from hospitals and health systems across Virginia. A report card for each local hospital in Virginia is available for review by visitors to www.vhha.com. Each scorecard provides information about health care-associated infections – catheter-associated urinary tract infections (CAUTI) and central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSI) – patient safety, hospital readmission rates, mortality data, patient satisfaction, and efficiency of Medicare spending per beneficiary. The report cards chart changes in categorical performance from 2010-2014, and list the data source for each category.

Click here to view the Quality and Patient Safety Scorecards.

The report cards are another example of how Virginia’s local hospitals and health systems promote transparency and work to educate the public in the name of fostering a healthier Virginia. In addition to the scorecards, VHHA recently unveiled its Community Health Legislative Dashboards which enable users to review key health and population statistics by region throughout the Commonwealth. The dashboards feature a slew of demographic data and statistical health markers corresponding to communities overlapping Virginia’s 100 House of Delegates districts and its 40 state Senate districts. Information available through the dashboard tool includes population figures; educational attainment and unemployment rates; local hospital admissions; the amount of charity care local hospitals provide; the number of community physicians; data on adult obesity, smoking rates, and premature deaths; the percentage of uninsured area residents; and mortality rates due to chronic conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, and lower respiratory disease. VHHA also maintains an updated PricePoint website that allows visitors to review demographic, quality, and charge information on Virginia hospitals to promote consumer awareness. Virginia’s hospitals are committed to providing hospital charge and quality data to help consumers make informed decisions about their health care.

VHHA President and CEO Sean Connaughton said the production and online publication of quality and patient safety report cards is part of an ongoing commitment by VHHA and its member local hospitals and health systems to constantly improve their operations and openly communicate with the public about how health care works.

“Our members are jointly working to make Virginia the healthiest state in the nation by 2020. The public and private sectors, as well as everyday Virginians, have a role in that process. For our part, VHHA and its member local hospitals and health systems are making available a wealth of data on quality and patient safety for public inspection. Providing access to up-to-date information about hospital performance, pricing, and public health enables Virginians to be informed about the health care system we all use,” said Connaughton. “The fact that Virginia’s hospitals are publicly showcasing this data demonstrates that they are dedicated health care providers always looking to improve. VHHA is providing this data for public use and we encourage people to take advantage of our useful and informative online tools.”

Like PricePoint and the dashboard tool, the Quality & Patient Safety Scorecard function now is a permanent feature on VHHA’s website. The scorecard tool gathers data from a host of sources including the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Virginia Health Information, and the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey.

About VHHA: The Virginia Hospital & Healthcare Association is an alliance of 107 hospitals and 30 health delivery systems that develops and advocates for sound health care policy in the Commonwealth. Through the power of collaboration, the association will be the recognized driving force behind making Virginia the healthiest state in the nation by 2020.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Julian Walker
Vice President of Communications
(804) 297-3193 office
(804) 304-7402 mobile
jtwalker@vhha.com