Here Are The Safest Hospitals In Every State

NEW YORK, NY — A new analysis has assessed thousands of hospitals across the country for patient safety and more than four in every 10 received a grade of "C" or worse. The Leapfrog Group released it’s bi-yearly hospital safety grades on Tuesday.

The assessment system assigns school-style letter grades to general acute-care hospitals. The hope is to determine a patient’s risk of further injury or infection if they visit a certain hospital.

The organization evaluated roughly 2,500 hospitals, and of those, 30 percent earned an “A” and 28 percent earned a “B” when it comes to preventing medical errors, accidents, injuries and infections, which collectively are the third leading cause of death in America. A “C” grade was given to 35 percent of hospitals, 6 percent earned a “D” and 1 percent earned an “F.”

The nonprofit took an optimistic look at the numbers and saw signs that hospitals are, overall, getting better.

“The national numbers on death and harm in hospitals have alarmed us for decades. What we see in the new round of Safety Grades are signs of many hospitals making significant improvements in their patient safety record,” Leah Binder, president and CEO of Leapfrog, said in a release.

Click here to find your hospital's grade.

Among the findings nationwide, five hospitals that received an “A” grade for the first time this year previously received an “F” grade, the group said. Furthermore, 46 hospitals earned an “A” for the first time since the grading system began six years ago.

Leapfrog said its analysis showed 89 hospitals that had previously received “D” or “F” ratings had improved to an “A” this year.

Rhode Island, Hawaii, Wisconsin and Idaho all previously ranked near the bottom of the state rankings with low percentages of “A” hospitals, but now all rank in the top 10.

Here are some of the other findings:

• The five states with the highest percentage of “A” hospitals this spring are Hawaii, Idaho, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Virginia
• Ten states have hospitals with “F” grades are California, the District of Columbia, Florida, Iowa, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey and New York

Leapfrog says you shouldn’t refuse emergency care because of a bad safety grade. They’re meant to be used as a guide for planned events and a research tool for potential emergencies.

Patch reporters Dan Hampton and Feroze Dhanoa contributed to this report.

Photo credit: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images