The following is a release from EvergreenHealth:

EvergreenHealth Medical Center earned a five-star rating in the most recent Hospital Compare overall quality systems rankings released last week by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). The health system has the only five-star rating from CMS in Washington state.

The Hospital Compare overall rating summarizes up to 64 quality indicators, published as an overarching star rating to simplify hospital comparisons and help patients make informed decisions about their care. CMS assigned ratings to 3,693 hospitals and only awarded 112 hospitals a score of five-stars in its newest rankings. While the most common overall rating in the country is three stars, more than 800 hospitals received just one or two stars on the latest quality assessment release.

CMS assigns hospitals an overall quality rating between one and five stars based on performance across seven groups of measures: mortality, readmission, patient experience, safety of care, effectiveness of care, timeliness of care and efficient use of medical imaging. Hospitals with higher overall hospital quality star ratings perform better on existing CMS quality measures compared to other facilities.

“We know that today’s consumers increasingly consider ratings and reviews before making purchasing decisions, and evaluating hospitals and health care providers has become no different,” said EvergreenHealth CEO Bob Malte. “To be the only hospital in our state to achieve this five-star rating is a reflection of the exceptional care and service that our providers, employees and volunteers deliver to our patients every day.”

Overall ratings are based on information captured through the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting Program and Hospital Outpatient Quality Reporting Program, including data reported by hospitals to CMS and through Medicare claims, as well as patient satisfaction scores and other information that is collected through Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) patient surveys.

Some measures used to calculate the overall rating are based only on data from Medicare patients while others take into account data from all patients.

CMS has long measured patient experience, along with many other quality measures, reporting the data on its website Hospital Compare. Facility-level data related to quality outcomes, readmissions, and complications rates is also published. CMS ratings also take into account payment and costs, and the value of care provided.

To access the CMS Hospital Compare website to determine the best health care system near you, visit www.medicare.gov/hospitalcompare/search.html.

For more information about the HCAHPS Star Ratings, including detailed results on the HCAHPS Summary Star Ratings, please visit the HCAHPS website at http://www.hcahpsonline.org/StarRatings.aspx.

For more information about EvergreenHealth’s commitment to quality and safety and exceptional care, visit www.evergreenhealth.com.