Stony Brook hospital ranks first on LI in annual state report

Plainview Hospital scored lowest in patient care and Stony Brook University Medical Center highest among Long Island's hospitals in an annual statewide hospitals report card.

In the eighth annual report card published Sunday by the nonprofit Niagara Health Quality Coalition, based near Buffalo, most of Long Island's 23 hospitals scored at the state average in 29 measures looking at death rates and patient safety measures - such as hip replacement deaths and postoperative infections. The report card, which uses data from 2008, also looked at patient satisfaction.

Plainview, part of the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, scored low in six areas. Among these were deaths from acute stroke and pneumonia and postoperative problems including embolisms or deep vein thrombosis.

Spokesman Terry Lynam said the 2-year-old data did not reflect improvements in care. In 2008, the hospital's rate of death from acute stroke was 1.4 percent; that dropped to 0.05 percent the next year, he said. There also had been improvements in rates of accidental punctures and embolisms and deep vein thrombosis, Lynam added.

For the second year in a row, Stony Brook scored best in more areas than any other Island hospital, including heart attack and congestive heart failure rates, which were among the lowest.

Stony Brook's chief quality officer, Dr. William Greene, attributed the scores to collecting data from myriad sources and making sure employees had easy access to them so they could make rapid adjustments in care.

"Our teams can find out how they are doing in as close to real time as possible," he said.

Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow and Long Beach Medical Center scored low on the five patient satisfaction questions, though their scores on actual patient care were higher.

NUMC's chief medical officer, Dr. Steven Walerstein, said aside from upgrading the hospital with a new emergency department and other modernization projects, NUMC has been holding seminars to help the staff communicate effectively with patients.

Cheryl Chapman, assistant administrator at Long Beach Medical Center, said the low scores on the surveys Niagara uses do not reflect responses the hospital gets from its own surveys.

Part of the problem is the way the surveys are worded, Chapman said. The hospital is focusing on making sure patients understand what care they are getting so that will be reflected in the surveys.