SEATTLE – (Jan. 17, 2017) – Virginia Mason today received the 2017 Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence™ from Healthgrades, an online resource for comprehensive information about hospitals and physicians across the United States.

An award recipient for the seventh straight year, Virginia Mason is recognized for superior clinical outcomes across a broad spectrum of care provided to Medicare patients over a three-year period. The medical center ranks among the top 5 percent of the more than 4,500 hospitals evaluated by Denver-based Healthgrades.

“Quality and safety are the foundation for everything we do,” said Virginia Mason Chairman and CEO Gary S. Kaplan, MD. “This award acknowledges the focus our physicians, nurses and other clinical team members demonstrate every day to ensure our patients receive appropriate, high-quality care.”

From 2013 through 2015 (the study period for the 2017 award), patients treated at Virginia Mason and the other 257 hospitals that earned the Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence were more likely to experience a successful clinical outcome than individuals treated at a hospital that did not receive the award, Healthgrades reported. During this period, if all other hospitals had performed at the level of the award recipients, an estimated 160,322 lives could potentially have been saved.

“Given the variation in quality care across the nation, it’s never been more important for consumers to do their homework when searching for a hospital,” said Brad Bowman, MD, chief medical officer, Healthgrades. “Those hospitals that have received Healthgrades’ 2017 Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence have proven their long-standing commitment to providing quality care to drive better health outcomes for their patients.”

Healthgrades evaluates hospitals on clinical outcomes among Medicare patients for at least 21 of the most common inpatient conditions and procedures. The primary information source was data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Hospitals cannot opt in or out of the evaluation, and no hospital pays to be evaluated by Healthgrades.

Learn more about the Distinguished Hospital Award for Clinical Excellence.

About Virginia Mason Health System
Virginia Mason, founded in 1920, is a nonprofit regional health care system based in Seattle that serves the Pacific Northwest. In the Puget Sound region, the system includes 336-bed Virginia Mason Hospital; a primary and specialty care group practice of more than 500 physicians; regional medical centers in Seattle, Bainbridge Island, Bellevue, Federal Way, Kirkland, Issaquah and Lynnwood; Bailey-Boushay House, the first skilled-nursing and outpatient chronic care management program in the United States designed and built specifically to meet the needs of people with HIV/AIDS; Benaroya Research Institute, which is internationally recognized for autoimmune disease research; and Virginia Mason Institute, which trains health care professionals and others from around the world in the Virginia Mason Production System, an innovative management methodology for continually improving quality, safety and efficiency. Virginia Mason online: VirginiaMason.org

Virginia Mason Health System also includes Virginia Mason Memorial, a 226-bed hospital serving the Yakima Valley in Central Washington since 1950. Memorial online: YakimaMemorial.org

Media Contact:
Gale Robinette
Media Relations Manager
Virginia Mason Health System
(206) 341-1509
gale.robinette@VirginiaMason.org