Baylor Dallas News

(DALLAS, TEXAS, Aug. 28, 2009) – Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas has received the Texas Health Care Quality Improvement Achievement Award from TMF® Health Quality Institute, the Medicare Quality Improvement Organization for Texas.

The award honors Texas hospitals that are performing quality initiatives aimed at improving outcomes in patient care by recognizing those hospitals that have improved their performance on specific national quality measures.

“We are proud of our commitment to quality, and this award illustrates our success in keeping it a top priority,” said John McWhorter, president, Baylor Dallas. “We are continually evaluating and improving our programs in order to provide the best possible outcomes for our patients.”

TMF established the awards program in partnership with The Texas Hospital Association, Texas Medical Association, Texas Organization of Rural & Community Hospitals and Texas Osteopathic Medical Association.

The awards acknowledge hospitals for improving care specifically related to acute myocardial infarction or AMI (heart attack), heart failure, pneumonia and surgical care. These clinical areas have been designated as national health care priorities by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and The Joint Commission, an independent nonprofit, standards-setting and accrediting body in health care.

“We know that using proven standards of care can save lives,” said Irving Prengler, M.D., vice president of Medical Affairs, Baylor Dallas. “Quality improvement is a complex and demanding process, but the outcomes speak for themselves.”

These CMS/Joint Commission priority areas were targeted because they measure care for common, serious health conditions that affect all adult patients. The quality measures—such as an initial antibiotic dose within four hours of admission for patients with pneumonia—are designed to ensure hospitals provide care consistent with current medical guidelines.

To qualify for the Quality Improvement Achievement Award, a hospital had to attain a minimum 80 percent for the Appropriate Care Measure and to have met all other awards requirements. These included passing validation of three quarters of data (quarters 1-3, 2008), having mortality scores within the projected range and submitting the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems Survey (HCAHPS) data. (Data for mortality rates and HCAHPS are not available for critical access hospitals and, therefore, were not part of the awards criteria for these hospitals.)

For more information on the awards program, see the TMF Health Quality Institute awards Web site at http://award.tmfhqi.net.

About Baylor Dallas

Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas, a 1025-bed not-for-profit academic hospital, is a major patient care and research center in the southwest. The nationally acclaimed medical center serves as flagship hospital for Baylor Health Care System and has earned Magnet status for "Excellence in Nursing Services" from the American Nurses Credentialing Center -- the organization's highest level of recognition. In addition to its Level 1 trauma center, Baylor Dallas is also home to many nationally ranked centers of excellence including transplantation, cardiovascular services, orthopaedics, oncology, digestive diseases, neurosciences and gynecology. In 2009, U.S. News & World Report recognized Baylor Dallas for the 17th consecutive year in its "America's Best Hospitals" guide.