January 19, 2018
HORNELL, NY – St. James Hospital just put out this statement on Friday evening:
HORNELL, N.Y. – St. James Mercy Hospital has received a four-star quality rating from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Comparative ratings on quality of care for more than 4,000 Medicare-certified hospitals across the country are posted on www.medicare.gov/hospitalcompare. One star is the lowest rating a facility can receive; five is the highest. St. James’ rating for the previous reporting period was three stars. Of 171 hospitals in New York, just 15 (9) received four-star ratings, according to CMS. Two received five-star ratings.
“The most improved area of performance, which led most directly to the additional star in our rating, was patient satisfaction,” said Neva Bossard, RN, MSN, St. James Chief Nursing Officer. “This is proof that our efforts are making a difference in the experience of our patients.”
The organization celebrated Friday by posting banners and signs around its facility informing staff and guests of the recognition. Cookies with four gold stars were also served in the cafeteria.
“It truly takes the efforts of every person in our facility to have a significant, sustained impact on quality and what patients experience when they receive care here,” Bossard said. “We thank our physicians, staff, providers, and volunteers, because their daily work on behalf of our patients and our community is what helped us achieve this milestone recognition.”
According to CMS, Hospital Compare is a consumer-oriented website that provides information on how hospitals provide care to their patients. This information can help consumers make informed decisions about health care. Hospital compare allows consumers to select multiple hospitals and directly compare performance measure information related to heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, surgery, and other conditions.
CMS believes that star ratings spotlight excellence in health care quality and make it easier for consumers to use the information on the Compare websites. This is consistent with the call for transparent, easily understood and widely available public reporting. The ratings also support using quality measures as a key driver of health care system improvement.
St. James Mercy Hospital was founded in 1890 and now provides a full range of inpatient and outpatient services, including emergency, acute medical and surgical, imaging (including mammography, digital imaging, Dexa scanning), and laboratory. Specialty services include orthopedics, general surgery, physical therapy, Express Care, a Coumadin clinic, cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation, and a personal emergency response system called MercyLine. The Hospital works on an ongoing basis to build collaborative relationships with a host of regional partners, in order to ensure the continued continuity of critical health care services in the Hornell community.
