ANTELOPE VALLEY HOSPITAL GETS A-PLUS ON PATIENT SAFETY.Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer LANCASTER - Antelope Valley This article is about the Los Angeles County region. For the census-designated place in Wyoming, see Antelope Valley-Crestview, Wyoming. The Antelope Valley Hospital has been named one of the top three in Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, for avoiding errors that can kill or further sicken patients. The hospital joined UCLA Medical Center UCLA Medical Center is a hospital located on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California. It is rated as one of the top three hospitals in the United States and is the top hospital on the West Coast according to US News & World Report. and Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital is a hospital in the city of Santa Barbara, California. It is owned and operated by Cottage Health Systems. It is the only Level II trauma center between Los Angeles (south) and the Bay Area (north) on coastal California. among 88 hospitals nationwide to receive patient-safety awards from a medical consulting firm Noun 1. consulting firm - a firm of experts providing professional advice to an organization for a fee consulting company business firm, firm, house - the members of a business organization that owns or operates one or more establishments; "he worked for a that analyzed patient records at 5,000 hospitals. ``It really is a testament to the overall patient culture at the hospital,'' said Denise Calkins, a client-services consultant for Denver-based HealthGrades. ``I think it's a sign of things to come for the hospital community,'' said Dr. Don Parazo, an Antelope Valley Hospital board member, at a news conference to announce the honor Wednesday. HealthGrades researchers analyzed hospital records for 37 million Medicare patients from 2000 to 2002 to determine the frequency of 13 problems, including bedsores Bedsores Definition Bedsores are also called decubitus ulcers, pressure ulcers, or pressure sores. These tender or inflamed patches develop when skin covering a weight-bearing part of the body is squeezed between bone and another body part, or a bed, developed by patients, failure by the staff to identify and treat complications, such as pneumonia in a knee-replacement patient, and bloodstream infections. The 88 hospitals that received the patient-safety award represent 2 percent of American hospitals, Calkins said. For seven years, HealthGrades has analyzed outcomes at 5,000 hospitals for patients with 28 types of diagnoses or procedures. This is the first year the firm used the same records to analyze patient safety at the hospitals. Some hospitals did well on patient-safety measurements but were not honored because they had not cared for enough patients with the diagnoses and procedures the firm examined. Others did generally well but had low ratings on certain procedures for reasons including high mortality rates or serious complications. Lancaster Community Hospital This article or section needs sources or references that appear in reliable, third-party publications. Alone, primary sources and sources affiliated with the subject of this article are not sufficient for an accurate encyclopedia article. , the Antelope Valley's other hospital, did not offer enough procedures or did not perform them on enough patients to be rated for patient safety, Calkins said. Nationwide between 2000 and 2002, HealthGrades identified 1.14 million hospital errors that contributed directly to 264,000 deaths among senior citizens, according to the firm's analysts. The errors also added $8.5 billion in costs to the Medicare system, the analysts said. The best hospitals - the top 7.5 percent of the hospitals studied - had five fewer deaths per 1,000 patients than the bottom 10 percent, HealthGrades said. |
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