Safety In Numbers: The Leapfrog Group’s Report on High-Risk Surgeries Performed at American Hospitals (2019)

Summary

The report from The Leapfrog Group analyses eight high-risk procedures to determine which hospitals and surgeons perform enough of them to minimise the risk of patient harm or death, and whether hospitals actively monitor to assure that each surgery is necessary. The report finds that the vast majority of participating hospitals do not meet The Leapfrog Group’s minimum hospital or surgeon volume standards for safety nor do they have adequate policies in place to monitor for appropriateness. Rural hospitals are particularly challenged in meeting the standards.

Leapfrog advises "given the variation in patient outcomes between higher-volume and lower-volume hospitals, the importance of patients using Leapfrog results to select a hospital for these high-risk procedures cannot be overstated."

Content

The Leapfrog Group is a US nonprofit organisation 'driving a movement for giant leaps forward in the quality and safety of American healthcare.' Their flagship Leapfrog Hospital Survey collects and transparently reports hospital performance to inform purchasers and giving consumers information 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.

Safety In Numbers summarises findings from the 2018 Leapfrog Hospital Survey, submitted by over 2,000 hospitals nationwide. This is the first year Leapfrog reported the new surgical standard by hospital, assessing whether both hospitals and surgeons met volume standards, and whether hospitals monitored for surgical necessity.

This Leapfrog report states that patients should be very careful before they choose a hospital for one of these high-risk procedures and should worry even more about hospitals that decline to report this information because 'candour and transparency is the necessary first step to improvement.'