A new report from the Leapfrog Group found that a hospital’s high safety grade does not address the disproportionate risk of adverse safety events among Black and Latino patients.
While higher-graded hospitals may be safer for all patients, they do not provide more equitable care than lower-rated facilities, according to the Leapfrog Group’s latest analysis.
The nonprofit watchdog organization examined the association between hospitals’ Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grades and equitable safety outcomes. The safety grades are determined, in part, using the patient safety indicators developed by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to assign a grade, either A, B, or C/D/F, for how well a hospital protects patients from preventable harm, such as in-hospital accidents, errors, injuries, and infections. The research team analyzed 2019 hospital discharge data from 15 states and over 10 million patients.
Key findings include:
- While A and B-graded hospitals were found to provide safer care across all racial/ethnic groups, Black and Hispanic patients and patients without private insurance had higher risks of adverse safety events across all hospitals regardless of their safety grade.
- Across all hospitals, Black patients had significantly higher rates of surgery related complications, including 34 percent higher rates of sepsis, 51 percent higher rates of dangerous blood clots, and 17 percent higher rates of respiratory failure. Hispanic patients also had a higher risk of sepsis (34 percent) and respiratory failure (21 percent) compared to white patients.
- Across all hospitals, Black patients had significantly higher rates of severe pressure ulcers compared to white patients.
- Patients covered by Medicare or Medicaid had higher rates of adverse safety events across all hospitals compared to patients with private insurance.
"We must honestly acknowledge the persistent racial and ethnic disparities, but we can't stop there," said Missy Danforth, vice president of health care ratings at the Leapfrog Group, in a statement. "Achieving safe care for all patients requires a focused commitment to transparency, better data collection and targeted interventions."
The research team also emphasized the need for policies to go beyond targeting hospitals’ overall average score but to also incorporate the difference in the quality of care hospitals deliver across all patient populations.