Fifteen Sutter hospitals earned an “A” Hospital Safety Grade from The Leapfrog Group, an independent national nonprofit focused on patient safety. This recognition is awarded to hospitals for their exceptional performance in patient safety and quality of care.

“This achievement reflects our unwavering commitment to patient safety and quality care,” said Dr. William Isenberg, chief medical and quality officer at Sutter Health. “Earning an ‘A’ grade is a testament to the dedication of our teams and their focus on delivering the safest possible care for our communities. This recognition reflects the trust our patients place in us and our shared commitment to creating safer, healthier neighborhoods across California.”

Hospitals that did not receive an “A” grade have established workplans to improve performance in the next evaluation cycle, drawing on best practices from Sutter hospitals that have consistently earned “A” grades.

Sutter’s Mills-Peninsula Medical Center has received the “Straight A” designation for six straight grading periods, dating back to Spring 2023.

Mills-Peninsula is especially proud of their focus on safety in two areas:

• Hand hygiene. While data is collected on the inpatient nursing units, leadership has established an all-hands on deck mentality that staff have embraced. Members from all nursing, ancillary and support departments participate in observing hand hygiene practices to ensure all staff are appropriately washing their hands for at least 20 seconds or using alcohol-based hand rub before and after interacting with patients. Two hundred observations per department per month are conducted with the goal of achieving at least 90% compliance. The hospital’s Quality, Patient Safety and Infection Prevention Department, in partnership with the Environmental Services team, also conduct quarterly infrastructure audits to ensure each department has proper hand hygiene equipment in place for its teams.
• Reliability coaches. Now in its seventh year, this program involves representatives from every department at the hospital. The reliability coaches are responsible for engaging their teams on patient safety, employee safety and environmental safety issues. They coach their team members on the error prevention tools of the month, and lead engaging conversations about how the tools can be used in their everyday duties to speak up for safety.

“We have a structure in place that prioritizes patient safety and employee engagement is high,” said Mills-Peninsula CEO Darian Harris. “Our team is focused on practicing what excellence looks like. We know the legacy of excellence that exists here. Every individual makes it possible for scores like this to happen.”

Leadership credits Mills-Peninsula’s strong safety culture for sustaining the Leapfrog “A” grade.

“There is a lot of pride in our safety culture because many of us receive care here,” said Elizabeth Asifo, director of quality and patient safety. “We realize how fortunate we are to receive such outstanding, safe care in our own community.”

Sutter hospital campuses earning an “A” grade include:

• Sutter’s Alta Bates Summit Medical Center – Summit Campus
• Sutter Amador Hospital
• Sutter Auburn Faith Hospital
• Sutter’s CPMC – Mission Bernal Campus
• Sutter Davis Hospital
• Sutter Delta Medical Center (improved from “B” in Spring)
• Sutter’s Eden Medical Center
• Sutter Medical Center, Sacramento
• Sutter’s Memorial Hospital Los Banos
• Sutter’s Mills-Peninsula Medical Center
• Sutter’s Novato Community Hospital
• Sutter Roseville Medical Center
• Sutter Santa Rosa Regional Hospital
• Sutter Solano Medical Center
• Sutter Tracy Community Hospital

Sutter hospital campuses earning a “B” grade include:

• Sutter’s Alta Bates Summit Medical Center – Alta Bates Campus
• Sutter’s CPMC – Van Ness Campus
• Sutter Coast Hospital
• Sutter’s Memorial Medical Center

Sutter hospital campuses earning a “C” grade include:

• Sutter’s CPMC – Davies Campus

Commitment to Safety

As a high-reliability organization, Sutter promotes a culture of safety in which everyone is empowered to speak up about potential safety concerns. Being high-reliability is more than a process — it’s a promise to make care safer and more consistent for every patient, every time. Efforts around this work include:

• The launch of Sutter Safe Care in 2018. The program kicked off Sutter’s journey to becoming a high-reliability organization, with comprehensive training of over 65,000 leaders, physicians, advanced practice clinicians and staff.
• Targeted training to onboard new leaders, employees and physicians, to ensure everyone adopts Sutter Safe Care’s high-reliability behaviors and key practices.
• A reliability coach program empowering frontline staff to support their peers with high-reliability behaviors. Currently, there are over 1,100 frontline reliability coaches across Sutter Health, and participation in the program continues to grow, year over year.

Leapfrog assigns an “A,” “B,” “C,” “D” or “F” grade to general hospitals across the country based on more than 30 measures of errors, accidents, injuries and infections as well as the systems hospitals have in place to prevent them.

The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade stands as the only hospital ratings program focused solely on preventable medical errors, infections and injuries. The program is peer-reviewed, fully transparent and free to the public. Grades are updated twice annually, in the fall and spring.

To explore full grade details, visit HospitalSafetyGrade.org.