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They’re some of the most famous hospitals in the world: Mayo Clinic, Cedars-Sinai, University of Michigan. Their experts are everywhere in the media, and their patients travel across the country and world to seek their leading-edge services. And yet, University of Utah Health Care (UUHC) beat every last one of them.
UUHC is ranked No. 1 nationally in quality, accountability and safety among academic medical centers Vizient Inc. announced last week at a Dallas ceremony. To the average patient, it might sound like insider baseball or just another obscure award, but earning the top spot in Vizient’s rigorous study means that the Utah community enjoys some of the safest, highest quality health care in the U.S.
“Are we harming patients or not? Are we responding to the patient’s view of quality?” said Robert Pendleton, M.D., the University’s chief medical quality officer. “Are we helping patients when they’ve got the odds stacked against them? If patients come to our hospital, do we transition them back into the community so they’re not readmitted?”
Those are the types of questions that Vizient’s Quality and Accountability Study — which included more than 100 of the country’s most esteemed academic medical centers — is all about. Over 80 different rigorous metrics evaluate survival rates, infection rates, complication rates and efficiency of care. It examined how patients did after they were released from the hospital; how satisfied they were with their care; and whether or not they felt like their providers really listened to them.
Health equity was another important aspect of the study: Do women who come to University Hospital get the same care as men? Are all races treated equally?
“This award is unique in that it recognizes health care centers for providing great care to patients across all clinical lines — not just one or two areas,” said Vivian Lee, M.D., Ph.D., M.B.A., CEO of University of Utah Health Care and dean of the School of Medicine. “I’m honored to be part of such a collaborative, innovative and talented group of people who are dedicated to improving lives and reducing suffering.”
The Vizient recognition marked the seventh straight year UUHC has been ranked a top-10 academic medical center. In 2010, UUHC claimed the No. 1 spot for the first time. The company the U is keeping couldn’t be better: Mayo Clinic is the only other institution to finish in the top 10 each year since 2010.
“Here at the University, our goal is to help patients become informed consumers who are able to make meaningful decisions related to their health care that translate into better outcomes,” said Pendleton, noting that choosing health care options should become as transparent as picking a hotel.
When booking a room, you check online ratings, read visitors’ comments and talk to friends and family about their own judgments. You don’t just focus on what the hotel manager thinks.
“It’s about making meaningful differences in patients’ lives, helping them to live longer and happier, and avoid complications,” Pendleton said. “That’s the end game, which really is why people get into health care — to make a difference.”
Vizient, Inc. is the largest member-driven health care performance company in the U.S. and has conducted the study annually since 2005. In previous years, the Vizient Awards were known as the University HealthSystem Consortium Awards.
