Joint Commission Names Top-Performing Hospitals

The Joint Commission is recognizing 405 hospitals in 45 states in the USA for attaining and sustaining accountability measure performance during 2010. These hospitals make up the top 14% of the 3,000 Joint Commission-accredited hospitals that report data for 22 accountability measures. The complete list of top performing hospitals and the measures that the hospitals were recognized for are available online here.

The Joint Commission measures are designed to determine if evidenced-based care is being provided to patients with common illnesses and diseases, such as pneumonia, myocardial infarction, and heart failure. Researchers found that adherence to the myocardial infarction care measures is up from 86.9% in 2002 to 98.4% in 2010. The 2010 pneumonia care result is 95.2%, up from 72.3% in 2002. The surgical care result has improved to 96.4% in 2010 from 82.1% in 2005, and the 2010 children’s asthma care result is 92.3%, up from 79.8% in 2008. The percentage of hospitals achieving composite accountability measures greater than 90% also has significantly improved. In 2010, 91.7% of hospitals achieved 90% compliance, compared to 20.4% in 2002.

Although there was improvement in several areas, there also were areas where hospitals still need to strengthen their processes. Only 60.5% of hospitals achieved 90% or higher compliance with administering fibrinolytic therapy for myocardial infarction within 30 minutes of the patient’s arrival, and only 72.2% of hospitals had 90% or greater compliance in providing antibiotics to patients with pneumonia in the intensive care unit.

In January 2012, all Joint Commission-accredited hospitals, except critical access hospitals, will be required to meet a new performance improvement requirement that establishes an 85% composite compliance target rate for performance on accountability measures. The new requirement is intended to help improve performance on selected core measures of patient care.