Massachusetts Hospital Safety Grades: See Who's On Top

Thirty-three Massachusetts hospitals received an A in hospital safety, according to new grades released by The Leapfrog Group on Tuesday. The hospital safety grades are released by the nonprofit group twice a year, in the spring and in the fall. The grades released on Tuesday showed that five states — Oregon, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Wisconsin and Idaho — showed significant improvement since the safety grades were first implemented in 2012.

“Errors and infections in hospitals are the third leading cause of death in America, and people deserve to know which of their hospitals are best at preventing them,” Leah Binder, president and CEO of Leapfrog, said in a press release.

Medical errors, accidents, injuries and infections are taken into account by Leapfrog when calculating the grades. The goal of the rankings is to determine a patient’s risk of further injury or infection if they visit a certain hospital.

Leapfrog assigns A,B,C,D and F letter grades to general acute-care hospitals in the United States. Leapfrog explains that the safety grade includes 27 measures that are taken together to produce a single letter grade representing a hospital’s overall performance in keeping patients safe from preventable harm and medical errors. The group uses performance measures from a variety of sources, including the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the Leapfrog Hospital Survey and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (You can read more about the letter grades here.)

Here’s the grades Massachusetts hospitals received, according to Leapfrog:

1. Cape Cod Hospital, Hyannis - A
2. Beth Israel Deacon Hospital Plymouth - A
3. Tobey Hospital, Wareham - A
4. St. Luke's Hospital, New Bedford - A
5. Addison Gilbert Hospital, Gloucester - A
6. South Shore Hospital, South Weymouth - A
7. Signature Healthcare Brockton Hospital - A
8. Beverly Hospital - A
9. Charlton Memorial Hospital, Fall River - A
10. Saint Anne's Hospital, Fall River - A
11. Carney Hospital, Dorchester - A
12. Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital - Milton - A
13. CHA Everett Hospital - A
14. Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston - A
15. Hallmark Health System Melrose-Wakefield Hospital - A
16. Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston - A
17. Brigham and Women's Faulkner Hospital, Boston - A
18. Mount Auburn Hospital, Cambridge - A
19. Winchester Hospital - A
20. Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital - Needham - A
21. Newton-Wellesley Hospital - A
22. Lahey Hospital and Medical Center, Burlington - A
23. Lawrence General Hospital - A
24. Holy Family Hospital - A
25. Emerson Hospital, Concord - A
26. Lowell General Hospital - Main Campus - A
27. Milford Regional Medical Center - A
28. Nashoba Valley Medical Center, Ayer - A
29. St. Vincent Hospital, Worcester - A
30. Holyoke Medical Center - A
31. Baystate Franklin Medical Center, Greenfield - A
32. Baystate Noble Hospital, Westfield - A
33. Berkshire Medical Center, Pittsfield - A
34. Harrington Memorial Hospital, Southbridge - A
35. Falmouth Hospital - B
36. Anna Jaques Hospital, Newburyport - B
37. Tufts Medical Center, Boston - B
38. Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston - B
39. CHA Cambridge Hospital - B
40. Hallmark Health System Lawrence Memorial Hospital of Medford - B
41. St. Elizabeth's Medical Center, Boston - B
42. Sturdy Memorial Hospital, Attleboro - B
43. Norwood Hospital - B
44. Holy Family Hospital at Merrimack Valley - B
45. Lowell General Hospital - Saints Campus - B
46. Marlborough Hospital - B
47. Heywood Hospital, Gardner - B
48. Baystate Medical Center, Springfield - B
49. Morton Hospital, Taunton - C
50. North Shore Medical Center - Salem Hospital - C
51. Steward Good Samaritan Medical Center, Inc. - C
52. North Shore Medical Center - Union Hospital, Lynn - C
53. Boston Medical Center - C
54. Leonard Morse Hospital, Natick - C
55. Metrowest Medical Center - C
56. UMass Memorial Medical Center - University Campus - C
57. UMass Memorial Medical Center - Memorial Campus - C
58. HealthAlliance Hospital, Leominster - C
59. Mercy Medical Center of Springfield - C
60. Cooley Dickinson Hospital, Northampton - C

Leapfrog notes that of the 2,632 hospitals graded in Tuesday’s update, 832 earned an “A,” 662 a “B,” 964 a “C,” 159 a “D” and 15 an “F.”

Story by Feroze Dhanoa, Patch National Staff

Editor's Note: An earlier copy of this story incorrectly listed Harrington Hospital as receiving a C grade. Harrington received an A. This change has been reflected.

Image via Shutterstock