North Vista Hospital Receives 5-Star Rating For General Surgery Care

North Vista Hospital’s quality of patient care cited by
HealthGrades’ 11th Annual Hospital Quality in America Study
Most comprehensive independent annual study of hospital quality in the nation

October 14, 2008 - North Vista Hospital today announced that it has received a top five-star rating for the quality of its general surgery care by HealthGrades, the healthcare ratings company.

2009 HealthGrades clinical achievements include:

• Ranked Best (#1) in NV for General Surgery
• Five-Star Rated for Bowel Obstruction Two Years in a Row (2008-2009)
• Received the Highest Possible Star Ratings for Treatment of Bowel Obstruction

“We are extremely proud to be recognized for our excellence in general surgery care,” said Vincenzo Variale, CEO of North Vista Hospital. “Nevada residents have been faced with unprecedented healthcare challenges in the last year. This award is a testament of our commitment to providing the best in quality patient care and to continue to meet the growing needs of the community.”

These findings were included in the eleventh annual HealthGrades Hospital Quality in America Study, which analyzed more than 41 million Medicare hospitalization records from 2005 to 2007 at the nation’s approximately 5,000 non-federal hospitals. Also according to the study, patients treated at the nation’s top-rated hospitals have a 70 percent lower chance of dying compared with the lowest-rated hospitals across 17 common procedures and conditions, ranging from heart attack and pneumonia care to respiratory failure.

While overall death rates declined from 2005 to 2007, the nation’s best-performing hospitals were able to reduce preventable deaths at a much faster rate than poor-performing hospitals, resulting in large state, regional and hospital-to-hospital variations in the quality of patient care, the study found.

Based on the study, HealthGrades today made available its 2009 quality ratings for virtually every hospital in the country at www.healthgrades.com, a Web site designed to help individuals research and compare local healthcare providers.

On its Web site, HealthGrades offers, free to consumers, quality ratings of 27 procedures and treatments for virtually every hospital in the country. The Web site is designed so that consumers can easily compare patient outcomes at their local hospitals for procedures ranging from aortic aneurysm repair to bypass surgery. Each hospital receives a star rating based on its patient outcomes in terms of mortality or complication rates for each procedure or treatment. Hospitals with outcomes that are above average to a statistically significant degree receive a five-star rating. Hospitals with average outcomes receive a three-star rating, and hospitals with outcomes that are below average receive a one-star rating. Because no two hospitals or their patients’ risk profiles are alike, HealthGrades employs extensive risk-adjustment algorithms to ensure that it is making analogous comparisons.