Alamance Regional receives “D” grade from national organization survey
Alamance Regional Medical Center is less than four miles down the road; its services are frequently used by students and faculty for care. In a recent rating issued by the LeapFrog Group, a non-profit organization that rates more than 1400 hospitals nationwide, Alamance Regional scored a D dropping from its C rating the year before.
The LeapFrog Organization evaluates hospitals in 28 different patient safety categories. Alamance Regional scored below proficiency in 21 of those categories, one of the categories is hand washing.
“I would certainly say that we were surprised,” said Dennis Campbell, Cone Health Vice President of Nursing and Patient Services for Behavioral Medicine.
Alamance Regional Medical Center scored a 21 in hand washing, with the best hospital rating being a 30, and hospitals score on average a 28 for this category. The hospital scored below average in other categories, as well. The following are the categories and ratings that Alamance received below average gradings.
Campbell said there are parts of the survey that misrepresent the Medical Center.
“I would tell you that quality care is being given all across Cone Health, do we get it right every single time?” he said. “No, and neither does any other hospital or healthcare organization across the country, I think sometimes when you take the snapshot in time of what an organization looks like you will find variation.”
Alamance Regional issued a statement that the data used by The LeapFrog Group was old, but Elon Local News reached out to LeapFrog which released the statement, “The hospital safety score uses the most recent publicly available data, and we are the nation’s leading advocates for receiving more up-to-the-minute data from the federal government.”
Although the data used for the rating dates back to 2011, it is the most up-to-date data that the government provides. LeapFrog also welcomes hospitals to submit their own data. After last spring’s rating of a C, Alamance Regional took that opportunity and submitted its most recent data to the organization for this evaluation, hoping to increase its grade but with the newly volunteered records the hospital came up even lower than before.
Campbell said that having a ‘one-size-fits-all’ grading system doesn’t take into account the volume of patients that ARMC sees each day in comparison to other hospitals.
LeapFrog released a statement that its survey measures errors, accidents, and infections that patients acquired at the hospital. The organization said all hospitals should avoid these errors, regardless of its size.
Although Alamance Regional received a poor grade, Campbell said it allows room for growth and improvement.
Regardless of the grade Alamance acknowledges that, “It is an opportunity for you to look at yourself and get better, I would not say that ARMC is the worst place to come and get care. I would say that ARMC like any other organization even in our region is always looking to get better, and oh wow heres an opportunity for you to do that because here are a couple of things that you can work on to get better,” Campbell said.
When asked what initiatives were being put into place to increase the rating that come out again in the spring, Campbell said Alamance Regional concentrates on the patients it serves.
“We are more focused on every patient, getting it right with every patient than we are spending a whole lot of time trying to fix a specific question on a survey,” Campbell said.
Senior Kirby Browning has visited the medical center three different times since 2011 for various reasons and said that this goes beyond a grade and is more of a matter of patient safety.
“It’s not like school where a D+ you still pass; no, you have patients in there that are getting sick and are dying,” Browning said.
Alamance Regional wasn’t the only hospital in the area to score below proficiency; only 23 out of the 77 evaluated North Carolina hospitals received an A. To see the breakdown of each category that the hospital was rated on visit the hospital safety score website.
The LeapFrog Group will be posting another grade in the spring, and Campbell says other ratings done on Alamance Regional for a comparison are CareChex, Premier, Consumer reports, and HospitalCompare.gov
WOW! it is as though these folks have been in another hospital! While they have all seen apparent substandard care, our family has seen AWESOME CARE!! With knee replacements, colon cancer surgery and care, stitches, heart care, broken bones and a traumatic head injury, our family has had many opportunities to receive care at ARMC and we have not seen anything but great care. I will grant that some of the hospitalists have been less than awesome, but I have seen worse at the main Moses Cone. We have always been attended by MD’s in the ER, never a PA. Long waits in the ER are common at every hospital because of people going there for e primary care treatment when they have no insurance, because they cannot afford a regular doctor visit. I am sorry others have been less happy with the care at ARMC. I have NEVER seen a staff member enter the room or exit without hand sanitizing. Whenever and whereverI feel I am not seeing proper care, I speak up!!!
For 1 they only ever have PAs working in this ER. Haven’t seen a Real Doctor there in Years. I went the because I couldn’t move from the neck down & the still in school PA told me that She Didn’t Consider this as an Emergency!!! Hello goofy couldn’t move & had Emergency Surgery after seeing a Real Doctor!!! 2nd a healthy 26 yr old went there was mis diagnosed sent home & died a few hours later. Honestly, ARMC gets a “F” for the Entire Facility. Unless you need stitches, stay away!!! I hope you at Moses Cone are reading this & Do Something about it!!! Thanks.
I don’t prefer care from any Moses Cone affiliated hospital. I have never received exceptional care from ARMC, Wesley Long, or Moses Cone. Althougth it’s further than I would like to drive to seek emergency care, High Point Reginional is my #1 choice.
My Dad walked into this place and left to hospice care, horrible care and I think they contributed to his passing!
I have had the worst possible ER service at this hospital and I drive to Moses Cone’s main hospital for any emergent care. Both of my parents had serious diagnosis errors in the ER. I have had good care when admitted by my personal physician, but I would NEVER go to this ER until the Cone Health System takes a hard look at its record and adds more doctors and nurses. Using the number of patients as an excuse doesn’t work for me. If you are understaffed, then increase staff so that patients get quality care. Simple fix.
I think that some of the RN are too busy gossiping about others while attending to the patients. My hubby was being taking from recovery to his room and the whole time the two RN was talking about someone elses marriage. They continued that even while the was hooking up everything. Then the other RN’s would come in and talk about their plans the next day. A group of them had plans to get together to go out to eat and to the movies. The RN that came in on night shifts were great and the RN that came in Saturday on 1st was great. I just think they need to keep their personal gossip and plans for when they are not attending a patient.
IT is terrible when you are waiting they tell people as they walking 4 hour wait! Are they discouraging us they don’t even no what’s wrong b4 they say it, come on now, they claim the long waits are the beds are full, then when you finally get called there several beds empty and all the staff is just sitting talking about lunch or who said what, I mean come on People go for help not to listen to hospital staff drama. service would be better if the staff actually was concerned and help in a timely matter. So it’s chapel hill or duke for now on,
Variability? They are seriously understaffed,and under qualified. Last time I was there, a woman was seizing in the waiting room from blood loss from a laceration to her leg. Someone else was bleeding from their head, and took them an hour to see him to check if it was life threatening, and then another 2-3 hours to be worked on.