Keck Hospital of USC earns five stars on CMS 2024 quality star rating report for second year in a row

(Press-News.org) LOS ANGELES — Keck Hospital of USC earned five stars, the highest rating possible, on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) 2024 quality star rating report. This is the second year in a row the hospital has received five stars. 

Only approximately 16% of hospitals across the country, 483 out of 3,076, received five stars out of a one-to-five-star rating system.  

“Receiving this prestigious recognition for the second time in a row validates the hospital’s continuous commitment to patient safety and best patient outcomes and is a testament to the dedication and hard work of our physicians, nurses and staff,” said Marty Sargeant, MBA, CEO of Keck Hospital and USC Norris Cancer Hospital. 

The CMS hospital quality star rating summarizes a variety of measures across five areas of quality into a single star rating for each hospital. The five areas include: 

Readmission — returns to the hospital following a hospitalization.  Mortality — death rates of patients in the 30 days following a hospitalization.  Safety of care — potentially preventable injury and complications due to care provided during a hospitalization.  Timely and effective care. Patient experience — such as how effectively physicians and nurses communicate to the patient and if a patient would recommend the hospital to others.   “A five-star rating means that Keck Hospital outperforms the national average in all five of these areas, which is a tremendous accomplishment,” said Stephanie Hall, MD, MHA, chief medical officer of Keck Hospital and USC Norris Cancer Hospital. “I am particularly proud of our continued successful efforts in the safety of care, including low rates of hospital-associated infections, and in our sustained performance in creating a positive patient experience.” 

She credits the high patient experience ranking in part to a leadership rounding program that launched two years ago, where hospital leaders conduct regular rounds in all of the hospital units.  

“Our patients feel very special and cared for when the hospital CEO or chief nursing officer appears by their bedside,” said Hall. “This is a wonderful way for our leaders, who are often removed from day-to-day patient care, to connect with our patients.” 

This CMS five-star designation follows on the heels of Keck Hospital earning an "A” Hospital Safety Grade from The Leapfrog Group, an independent national watchdog organization, this spring. The Leapfrog Group assigns grades A – F to general hospitals across the country based on over 30 measures of errors, accidents, injuries and infections and the systems hospitals have in place to prevent them. This is the eighth “A” grade that Keck Hospital has received in the last five years. 

The CMS rating system was launched in 2016 to help patients and caregivers make informed decisions when selecting a hospital. Hospitals report quality data to the CMS through multiple reporting programs, and the data is then reviewed and standardized to calculate hospital star rankings.  

For detailed information on how Keck Hospital scored on quality measures, please click here.   

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Keck Hospital is part of Keck Medicine of USC. For more information about Keck Medicine, please visit news.KeckMedicine.org.   

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