Houston Medical Center On Quality Honor Roll

Houston Medical Center has been named to the Georgia Hospital Association’s (GHA) Partnership for Health and Accountability (PHA) Quality Honor Roll. HMC is one of 70 hospitals in Georgia to be placed on the GHA list for Quality Honor Roll. There are three categories of the Honor Roll: Basic, where a hospital must be rated at 91 to 92.9 percent on appropriate care management; Presidential, 93 to 97 percent; and Chairman’s, 98 to 100 percent. Houston Medical Center is rated in the Basic Honor Roll category. The honor roll is based on clinical data provided by the federal Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS), which administers the nation’s Medicare and Medicaid programs. The data was collected from October of 2008 through September of 2009.

“This is a great accomplishment for Houston Medical Center,” said Joseph Parker, president of GHA. “This recognition further underscores the commitment of the Houston Medical Center staff to ensuring that every patient receives the best, most effective health care possible.”

All acute care hospitals are required to submit care data to CMS. This data details how well a hospital’s caregivers adhere to a list of eight Appropriate Care Measures (ACM), which are the clinical processes of care that are known to be the most effective methods of treatment for patients who have suffered heart attacks, heart failure or pneumonia. The ACM is a composite measure that determines whether or not a patient received the right care at the right time.

For instance, a recommended treatment to help prevent a heart attack is to take aspirin either before or upon arrival at the hospital, as well as at discharge. A suggested treatment for pneumonia is to administer an antibiotic within four hours of a patient’s arrival. A hospital’s adherence to these recommended clinical practices usually leads to better outcomes.

“It is our mission to ensure that each of our patients receive the right care at the right time and this recognition validates this,” said Skip Philips, President and CEO. “This honor is a tribute to the hard work and dedication of our staff who are constantly working to make excellent care even better.”

About PHA

The Partnership for Health and Accountability, formed in January 2000 and sponsored by the Georgia Hospital Association, is a unique statewide collaborative that brings together health care providers with community agencies and individuals to achieve healthy communities. PHA includes representation from groups like hospitals, physicians, state health officials, legislators and businesses.