April O'Neil / news@WHMI.com

Four Trinity Health Michigan hospitals earned an "A" rating from a national quality and safety organization for implementing safety standards at their facilities.

Trinity Health Livingston, Trinity Health Oakland, Trinity Health Grand Rapids, and Chelsea Hospital, a joint venture with Trinity Health and University of Michigan Health, have all earned an “A” Hospital Safety Grade from The Leapfrog Group.

Leapfrog assigns an “A,” “B,” “C,” “D” or “F” grade to general hospitals across the country based on more than 30 national performance measures reflecting errors, accidents, injuries, and infections, as well as the systems hospitals have in place to prevent harm.

“Safety is among our core values at Trinity Health Michigan, so it’s incredibly meaningful for us to receive this recognition,” said Rosalie Tocco-Bradley, M.D., PhD, chief clinical officer of Trinity Health Michigan. “We work diligently seven days a week, 24 hours a day, to provide the highest quality of care to all our patients in Southeast and West Michigan. I am so proud of all the hard work and effort of our physicians, support staff and everyone in between who once again made this recognition possible.”

The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade is the only hospital ratings program exclusively based on hospital prevention of medical errors, infections and injuries that kill more than 500 patients a day nationally. The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade is peer-reviewed, fully transparent and free to the public. Grades are updated twice annually in the fall and spring.

“Earning an ‘A’ Grade means these hospitals made a true commitment to put patients first,” said Leah Binder, president and CEO of The Leapfrog Group. “We congratulate the leadership, Board, clinicians, staff and volunteers that all had a role to play in this achievement.”

The quality of patient care across many areas of hospital performance is considered in establishing the qualifications for the award, including infection rates, practices for safer surgery and maternity care. The rigorous standards are defined in each year’s Top Hospital Methodology.

To see the full grade details and to access patient tips for staying safe in the hospital, visit the provided link.

Trinity Health Michigan is one of the state’s largest employers with more than 24,000 full-time employees serving 29 counties.

Chelsea Hospital is a not-for-profit joint venture hospital, whose partners are Trinity Health Michigan, a Catholic health care system, and Michigan Medicine, the academic medical center of the University of Michigan. Chelsea Hospital employs more than 1,200 individuals with a medical staff of approximately 800 physicians.