The Leapfrog Group's methodology for calculating hospital safety grades discriminates against hospitals that do not participate in the Leapfrog Survey, according to an article in the Journal of Hospital Medicine.
The Leapfrog safety grade assigns an A through F grade to hospitals across the U.S., comparing each one to the general hospital population. Somewhat less than half of these hospitals also participate in the Leapfrog Survey, designed to collect the information by which Leapfrog computes its rankings.
Researchers double-checked the accuracy of Leapfrog's method by examining Leapfrog safety scores for 35 hospitals from U.S. News World Report's "Best Hospitals" list, comparing scores for hospitals that had participated in the Leapfrog Survey (18 hospitals) separately from those who had not participated (17 hospitals).
Hospitals that had participated in the Leapfrog Survey averaged an 'A' safety grade, while hospitals that did not participate in the survey averaged a 'B'. Alternative measures Leapfrog uses to calculate safety scores for nonparticipating hospitals may be the cause of the discrepancy, according to the article, suggesting Leapfrog's proxy measures for safety calculations should be adjusted.
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