St. Joseph’s Health named Top Hospital

Syracuse, NY (December 18, 2019) – St. Joseph’s Health Hospital has been named a 2019 Top Hospital by the Leapfrog Group. The Top Hospital award recognizes the highest quality hospitals as identified through the Leapfrog Hospital Survey. Less than six percent of all eligible facilities receive this elite award. Of the three New York hospitals to be recognized, St. Joseph’s Health Hospital is the only one to be honored in the Top Teaching Hospital category.

All hospitals considered for any Top Hospital Award must rank in the top 10% of all hospitals for their overall Value Score, which is a weighted, composite score of the most important national patient safety, quality, and resource use standards, as assessed through the Leapfrog Hospital Survey.

“Our commitment to care starts with the next generation of physicians whom we are training at St. Joseph’s Family Medicine Residency program and those nurses who come through our College of Nursing,” said Leslie Paul Luke, president and CEO at St. Joseph’s Health. “This award affirms our commitment to deliver the best possible care to our patients as well as our efforts to improve and grow as a top healthcare provider in the region.”

St. Joseph’s Health is also the only hospital in Central New York to be awarded an ‘A’ from The Leapfrog Group’s Safety Grade this fall. The Safety Grade system assigns an ‘A’, ‘B’, ‘C’, ‘D’ or ‘F’ grade to hospitals across the country based on their performance in preventing medical errors, injuries, accidents, infections and other harms to patients in their care.

The Leapfrog Group is a nonprofit watchdog organization that serves as a voice for health care purchasers, using their collective influence to foster positive change in U.S. health care.

Developed under the guidance of a national Expert Panel, the Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade uses 28 measures of publicly available hospital safety data to assign grades to more than 2,600 U.S. acute-care hospitals twice per year. The Hospital Safety Grade’s methodology is peer-reviewed and fully transparent, and the results are free to the public.

A teaching hospital is a hospital engaged in an approved GME residency program in medicine, osteopathy, dentistry, or podiatry.

Award recipients were officially announced at Leapfrog Group’s Annual Meeting and Awards Dinner on Tuesday, December 17th in Washington D.C.

About St. Joseph’s Health

St. Joseph’s Health is a regional non-profit health care system based in Syracuse, NY. St. Joseph’s has been an innovative leader in health care since our founding in 1869 as the first hospital open to the public in the city of Syracuse. Offering primary, specialty and home care, a Magnet-recognized hospital, and collaboration with community partners, St. Joseph's Health advances the well-being of the communities we serve through an expanding range of services to ensure our patients achieve optimum long-term health. St. Joseph’s is ranked by Consumer Reports among the top 15 heart surgery centers in the country, a designated Stroke Center and a U.S. News “Best Regional Hospital.” St. Joseph’s Health is affiliated with Franciscan Companies and St. Joseph’s Physicians, and is a member of Trinity Health. St. Joseph’s Health is celebrating our 150th Anniversary throughout 2019. For more information on our founding Sisters of St. Francis including Saint Marianne Cope, our legacy and our innovations, visit www.sjhsyr.org/legacy.

About The Leapfrog Group

Founded in 2000 by large employers and other purchasers, The Leapfrog Group is a national nonprofit organization driving a movement for giant leaps forward in the quality and safety of American health care. The flagship Leapfrog Hospital Survey collects and transparently reports hospital performance, empowering purchasers to find the highest-value care and giving consumers the lifesaving information they need to make informed decisions. The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade, Leapfrog’s other main initiative, assigns letter grades to hospitals based on their record of patient safety, helping consumers protect themselves and their families from errors, injuries, accidents and infections.