LANSING, Mich. (Michigan News Source) – The Leapfrog Group has released its Fall 2023 report on hospital safety ratings, awarding general hospitals across the country a letter grade based on publicly available patient safety data.

Eighty-three Michigan hospitals were included in the study. Of these, 29% received a grade of A, while 65% received a grade of B or C. DMC Detroit Receiving Hospital, DMC Sinai-Grace Hospital, and McLaren Oakland received grades of D.

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McLaren Flint received an F due to concerns about infection risk, surgery problems, and practices to prevent errors. The hospital made the news earlier this year when a disgruntled former patient was arrested for threatening to drive his truck through the hospital doors and shoot up the campus.

According to Leapfrog, hospitals with D and F grades carry nearly twice the risk of mortality as A hospitals. A study by the Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety found that over 50,000 lives could be saved annually if all hospitals performed at the level of A grade hospitals.

Leapfrog’s latest report found that, nationally, only 1% of hospitals received an F grade, while nearly 30% received an A grade. Since the pandemic, over 85% of hospitals have improved performance on at least one of the three dangerous infections considered in the report, including MRSA, central line-associated bloodstream infections, and catheter-associated UTIs.

“Now that we have pre- and post-pandemic data for patient safety measures, we are encouraged by the improvement in infections and applaud hospitals for reversing the disturbing infection spike we saw during the pandemic,” said Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. “However, there’s still more work to be done. It’s deeply concerning that patient reports about their health care experience continues to decline.”

Binder says the decline in patient experience is likely a result of staffing shortages.