Recently, The Bradford Era published a story reporting on local hospital safety scores released by Consumer Reports Magazine.

Upper Allegheny Health System and its member hospitals, Bradford Regional Medical Center and Olean General Hospital firmly believe in public reporting and transparency.   However, in the confusing world of hospital safety reports, it is important for the public to know that there are more than a dozen organizations which generate hospital quality reports using different, inconsistent and sometimes old data. Although useful tools to some extent, many public report cards provide incomplete snapshots of hospitals and are not accurate portrayals of the quality of care provided to patients.

In the case of Consumer Reports, we believe that their report does not accurately reflect the quality of care at BRMC and OGH. We also believe that it is significantly less reliable than other public reports. Last year the New York State Commissioner of Health, a staunch advocate of public reporting, criticized the 2013 Consumer Reports study noting that it “relied on incomplete data and flawed methods to draw its conclusions.”

Both BRMC and OGH take an aggressive and sustained approach to quality improvement.  Both hospitals continue to invest in technology, systems and employee training to ensure exemplary levels of quality care.  In 2013 both hospitals were ranked in the top 10 percent of hospitals in the nation for patient safety by Healthgrades.

Again, we are all for providing the public with hospital quality report cards, but if they are to be useful tools they need to be based on reliable, consistent and meaningful data. The hospital industry believes that Consumer Reports does not meet this this test.

Dennis J. McCarthy

Vice President, Marketing Communications

Upper Allegheny Health System