THE JOURNAL & TOPICS NEWSPAPERS | THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 2008
Hospitals Below Average?
By TOM ROBB
JOURNAL REPORTER
The U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services recently released a survey that gauges how area hospitals provide service to their customers seeking medical care.
The survey lists hospitals in the Northwest suburbs and Northwest side of Chicago that fail to meet state and national averages in the areas of com!munication, caring staff, clean rooms and speed of service.
Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, Alexian Brothers Medical Center in Elk Grove Village, Northwest Community Hospital in Arlington Heights and Resurrection Medical Center on the Northwest side of Chicago all received lower than average marks in many areas of the survey.
The national average of pa!tients who "would definitely recommend" their hospital was 67% and 66% in Illinois.
Lutheran General and Northwest Community re!ceived above average marks with 70% for the Park Ridge facility and 69% for the Arlington Hts.-based hospital. Below average were Alexian with 64% and Resurrection with 62%.
Patients who rated their hospitals a 9 or 10 on a scale of 1 to 10 nationally was 63% and 62% in Illinois.
One hospital, Northwest Community, made the state average of 62%.
The others trailed with Lutheran General at 59%, Alexian at 57% and Resurrection at 48%.
Speed of care was another area where area hospitals lagged. The national average for "patients always received help as soon as they wanted" was 60% nationally and in Illinois.
Northwest Community re!ceived the closest to the aver!age in this category with 56%. Alexian scored 55%, Resurrection scored 54% and Lutheran General 49%.
Communication is an area where area hospitals also fell short.
The average for doctors who "always communicated well" is 80% for doctors in Illinois and 79% nationally.
Resurrection, Lutheran General, Alexian all scored 77% for their doctors' com!munication skills while Northwest Community scored 74%.
The average for nurses who "always communicated well" with patients was 73% in both Illinois and nationally.
Only Resurrection made the average of 73%. Lutheran General scored 70% and Northwest Community and Alexian 71% each.
Cleanliness of rooms was another challenge for area hos!pitals. The national average was 69% and the state average 68%.
All area hospitals fell short of federal and state averages in cleanliness. Alexian garnered the highest marks with 65%, Northwest Community with 63%, Advocate with 62% and Resurrection 60%.