Fairview Lakes Medical Center a Top Performer

in Groundbreaking National Study

WYOMING, MN (November 14, 2005) –Fairview Lakes Medical Center, Wyoming, today was among the top performing hospitals recognized nationally for clinical outcomes as part of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Premier Quality Incentive Demonstration project.

Data from the first year of CMS/Premier Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration (HQID), validated by CMS and reported publicly Nov. 14, demonstrate a significant improvement in the quality of care across five clinical focus areas as measured by 33 nationally standardized and widely accepted quality indicators. The average improvement across the clinical areas was 6.6%.  CMS reports that approximately 235 acute myocardial infarction (heart attack) patients were saved as a result of quality improvements in that related focus area alone.

Medicare is awarding $8.85 million to hospitals that achieved the highest levels of performance at the end of the first year of the project. This is the first time that Medicare has awarded actual monetary bonuses to health care providers in a pay-for-performance demonstration.

The financial component of the HQID will reward hospitals performing in the top 10 percent for a given clinical focus with an additional 2 percent bonus on their Medicare payments for patients in that clinical area.  Hospitals in the top 20 percent will receive a 1 percent bonus.

Based on its overall quality score for the first year of the demonstration, Fairview Lakes Medical Center will receive a bonus payment of $26,000 from CMS. Other Fairview hospitals receiving cash bonuses in the CMS initiative were Fairview Southdale, Fairview Ridges and the University of Minnesota Medical Center, Fairview. 

Fairview Lakes partners with Fairview Southdale to provide rapid, high quality care to heart attack patients. Southdale scored in the top 10 percent for care of heart attack patients nationally and the top 20 percent for coronary artery bypass grafts surgery to earn a bonus of $162,000 through the CMS project.

The HQID, which began in October 2003, tracks process and outcome measures in five clinical areas – acute myocardial infarction (AMI), heart failure, coronary artery bypass graft (CABG), pneumonia, and hip and knee replacement.

Five hospitals performed within the top 20 percent for all focus areas in which they participated in year one. Hackensack University Medical Center (Hackensack, N.J.) and McLeod Regional Medical Center (Florence, S.C.) were top performers in all five focus areas; Fairview Lakes Regional Medical Center (Wyoming, Minn.), placed in the top deciles for all three clinical conditions in which it participated.

“Quality is a core value and a leadership priority in the demonstration’s top performing hospitals,” said Stephanie Alexander, senior vice president and general manager of Premier Healthcare Informatics. “These hospitals’ outstanding clinical performance begins with executive support, a strong culture of quality, and the dedication of the appropriate resources.”

Fairview Lakes Medical Center in Wyoming, MN, a division of Minneapolis-based Fairview Health Services, provides hospital, emergency and outpatient/ ambulatory care to residents of nearly two dozen rapidly growing communities in East Central Minnesota. In addition to the regional medical center in Wyoming, Fairview Lakes operates an occupational health program and a home health care and hospice department in Chisago City and physician’s clinics in Lino Lakes, Hugo, Chisago City, North Branch and Rush City. For more information about Fairview Lakes, go to lakes.fairview.org.

For a complete review of the demonstration, the year one results, and to view those hospitals ranking in the top 50 percent in each focus area, visit www.premierinc.com/qualitydemo .