Health & Fitness

Virginia, DC Hospital Safety Grades Released For Fall 2018

The nonprofit group Leapfrog released its bi-annual round of hospital safety grades. See what grade your hospital in DC, Virginia scored.

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WASHINGTON, DC — Thirty-four Virginia hospitals received an A grade in hospital safety, according to new Fall 2018 ratings released by the Leapfrog Group on Thursday. Virginia is one of five states with the most A grades, while The District and two states had no A grades. The nonprofit group found that of the more than 2,600 hospitals graded in the country, 32 percent earned an A grade.

Another 19 Virginia hospitals received a B grade, while 12 received a C, and one was given a D grade. No hospitals in the state received an F grade.

The Leapfrog Group explains that its rating system is focused entirely on errors, accidents, injuries and infections. The hospital safety grades are released by the nonprofit group twice a year, in the spring and in the fall.

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New Jersey, Oregon, Virginia, Massachusetts and Texas had the highest percentage of hospitals that received an A grade. The states with the lowest percentage of hospitals that received an A grade are Connecticut, Nebraska, Washington D.C., Delaware and North Dakota, according to Leapfrog. Washington D.C., Delaware and North Dakota did not have a single hospital that received an A grade.

Here are the grades Virginia hospitals were given by the Leapfrog Group:

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A grades

B grades

C grades

D grade

Here are the grades Washington, D.C., hospitals were given by the Leapfrog Group:

B grade

C grades

D grades

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"Health care was an important issue in the 2018 midterm elections, yet both parties are still neglecting the third leading cause of death in America—errors and infections in hospitals," Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group, said in a press release. "Every elected official, from city councilors, to senators, to the President, should hold hospitals accountable and support efforts to improve patient safety."

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 28 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.)

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