Ratings group commends hospitals' specialties
October 14, 2009
By SUSAN FRICK CARLMAN
Area hospitals are absent from a new ranking of top hospitals and the work they do. But the 12th annual study by the independent medical care ratings organization HealthGrades does include several of the life-saving specialty programs provided at Edward, Central DuPage and Advocate Good Samaritan hospitals, among other health care facilities in the area.
In Illinois, only Alexian Brothers Medical Center in Elk Grove Village, Evanston Hospital and Skokie Hospital made "America's 50 Best Hospitals" list. According to the study's authors," patients at highly rated hospitals have a 52 percent lower chance of dying compared with the U.S. hospital average, a quality chasm that has persisted for the last decade even as mortality rates, in general, have declined."
The yearly evaluation includes all U.S. hospitals except those operated by the Veterans Administration or the military.
Naperville's Edward Hospital was recognized for its cardiac services, coronary intervention and stroke care.
Mark Goodwin, MD, medical director of the hospital's cardiac catheterization lab and a diagnostic and interventional cardiologist with Midwest Heart Specialists, was quick to spread the credit around.
"It really is a commitment from everybody," said Goodwin, who helped establish the hospital's outpatient Cardiovascular Institute in 1993. "It's a great facility, great nurses, talented physicians and an institution that supports them."
After The Sun left him a phone message Monday afternoon, Goodwin apologized for his delay in returning the call, noting that he was unexpectedly attending to a 20-year-old who arrived in cardiac arrest.
"She's alive, she's awake, I just talked to her," he said Tuesday morning. "Seeing really young people is rare. One thing that you want to do when you see someone of that age is to have the best-equipped facility possible."
The recognition given for the hospital's stroke specialty also is a result of teamwork, and funding.
Dr. Jeff Miller, medical director of the Edward Neuroscience Institute, said the new $5 million lab makes it possible for a surgeon, using a catheter to access the clot responsible for the stroke, to reach the location in the brain and alleviate the obstruction within eight hours of the episode's beginning.
"If you try and treat stroke past that and try to put a blood supply back in the brain, that makes a bleed, which makes it worse," Miller said.
The institute is worthy of the HealthGrades distinction, he said.
"Edward has done a lot to deserve this," Miller said. "They're very focused on the neurosciences and stroke, especially out here in the suburbs."
Special awards for excellence in clinical care and women's health issues went to Good Samaritan and Central DuPage hospitals and Joliet's Provena St. Joseph Medical Center, all of which were recipients of those honors last year. Recognition for patient safety also was given to Central DuPage, which now has won that award three years in a row.
Good Samaritan also was distinguished for its cardiac, pulmonary and stroke care.
Jennifer Dooley, manager of communications and government relations, said the Downers Grove health care campus has established a name for itself in those specialties.
"We are a designated primary stroke care center by the Joint Commission (on Health Care Organizations), and that's for meeting the specialized needs of stroke patients for long-term success," Dooley said.
The HealthGrades study found that hospitals that carry the certification have an 8 percent lower risk-adjusted mortality rate than noncertified hospitals.
Good Samaritan's cardiac response team has demonstrated its edge as well.
A cardiac-alert protocol at the hospital enables patients to be in treatment within 59 minutes, on average, from the time they arrive in the emergency room, said Dooley, who cited a national average of 90 minutes. The program puts the cardiac team at the ready and waiting for the patient when he or she arrives in the emergency department. The team had a 14-minute "door to balloon" time - from the individual's arrival to the opening of a stent in the cardiac catheterization lab - last November.
In addition to its category wins, Central DuPage won recognition in the specialty areas of cardiac services, coronary intervention, gastrointestinal care and stroke services. Provena St. Joseph and Silver Cross Hospital, also in Joliet, were singled out for the quality of their treatment in stroke cases as well.
A dozen facilities were named for outstanding patient experience, including Delnor Community Hospital in Geneva and Silver Cross. The remaining winners in that category are outside metropolitan Chicago.
The awards were the latest in a series of honors given to hospitals in DuPage County. In July 2008, U.S. News & World Report ranked Edward Hospital 47th nationally in treating gastrointestinal disorders, and declared Central DuPage 47th in the orthopedics specialty. The Winfield hospital moved up to 35th in this year's ranking.
For the complete outcomes of the newest study, go to www.healthgrades.com.
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