Top 100 Heart Hospitals
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In 2005 and again in 2007, Holston Valley Medical Center was named one of America’s 100 best heart hospitals, a significant designation that is a result of the facility’s superior patient outcomes, quicker recovery times and shorter lengths of stay.
Holston Valley was one of just four Tennessee hospitals – and the only hospital east of Knoxville – to be recognized as a Top 100 heart hospital in the national 2007 Thomson 100 Top Hospitals: Cardiovascular Benchmarks for Success. The comprehensive study examined the performance of nearly 1,000 U.S. hospitals by analyzing their outcomes for eight measures related to congestive heart failure, heart attacks, coronary artery bypass grafts and percutaneous coronary interventions such as angioplasties.
The Top 100 hospitals are those facilities that not only produce the best clinical outcomes for cardiovascular care but also treat heart patients in less time and at a lower cost.
The Thomson study, in its ninth year, found several important statistics.
- Hospital stays at the top 100 hospitals were 12 percent shorter, on average, than peer hospitals (5.14 days compared with 5.85 days).
- Costs averaged 13 percent — or about $2,000 — less per case than peer hospitals.
- If all cardiovascular hospitals achieved the same results as the 100 top hospitals, according to the study, more than 7,000 lives would be saved and nearly 750 medical complications would be avoided annually.
The study analyzed acute-care hospitals nationwide using detailed empirical performance data from publicly available 2005 and 2006 Medicare MedPAR data and 2006 Medicare cost reports. Thomson Healthcare researchers scored hospitals in eight key performance areas: risk-adjusted medical mortality, risk-adjusted surgical mortality, risk-adjusted complications, core measures score, percentage of CABG patients with internal mammary artery use, procedure volume, severity-adjusted average length of stay and wage- and severity-adjusted average cost.
The Regional Heart Center at Holston Valley has long been a leader in cardiac services. The hospital was the site of the region’s first open-heart surgery in 1979, and Holston Valley has been nationally recognized for its exemplary door-to-balloon times for heart-attack patients.