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SALT LAKE CITY — A recently concluded quality of care study has ranked the University of Utah Health system sixth among 107 academic medical centers nationwide.
The system was ranked for the safety, timeliness, effectiveness, efficiency and equity of its care, as well as its focus on patients, University of Utah Health spokeswoman Kathy Wilets said in a statement.
The review, named the Vizient Quality and Accountability Study and formerly called the University HealthSystem Consortium Awards, has ranked University of Utah Health in the top 10 for eight consecutive years, including No. 1 rankings last year and in 2010.
Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, which earned this year's top ranking, is the only other organization to receive a top 10 ranking for eight years in a row.
“Eight years running is an amazing achievement. … It also means U of U Health posts low mortality rates and that patients receive some of the safest care in the country," Dr. Robert Pendleton, chief medical quality officer for University of Utah Health, said in a statement. "When discharged, they’re less likely to need to be readmitted."
Gordon Crabtree, CEO of University of Utah Hospitals and Clinics, lauded the study for being "based on actual care delivery — not reputation."
"It’s an 'apples to apples’ comparison of academic medical centers, which care for the most complex and sickest patients in the country,” Crabtree said in a statement.
A care assessment survey given to patients, as well as metrics used by multiple outcomes databases, were used to compile the rankings, Wilets explained. Vizient, which is a supply, analytics and consulting health care company with member hospitals around the country, announced the rankings Thursday at a conference in Denver. Rankings from the study have been released each year since 2005.
The Vivient study also ranked University of Utah Health fifth specifically for "ambulatory care," an award given for outpatient care quality, out of 161 community hospitals that were considered. This is the third consecutive year the organization has placed in the top five in that category.
After Mayo Clnic, NYU Langone Health, Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin, Rush University Medical Center and the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center were also ranked in the top five. Finishing just behind University of Utah Health, UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital, Lehigh Valley Health Network, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston and the University of Kansas Hospital rounded out the top 10.
