St. Luke’s hospitals have received the highest possible quality rating – five stars – from the annual quality and safety hospital review conducted by the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS).

St. Luke’s was the only health network in the Lehigh Valley to receive the best ratings, which were published by the federal government today.

“St. Luke’s is proud to consistently earn the highest rankings for superior quality and outcomes on multiple national lists based on objective data sources,” SLUHN Vice President & Chief Quality Officer Donna Sabol said. “This is a credit to our 20,000 employees and their unwavering commitment to all-around excellence.”

The CMS ratings are based on an examination of the quality of care at Medicare-certified hospitals across the country. The quality measures include safety and value of care, readmission, infection, complication rates, mortality, patient experience, effectiveness and timeliness of care and efficient use of medical imaging.

Nationwide, on elite 8 percent of 4,558 eligible hospitals earned five stars.

Of 11 eligible St. Luke’s acute care hospitals, 10 received five stars:

• St. Luke’s University Hospital (Bethlehem, Allentown and Sacred Heart campuses)
• St. Luke’s Anderson Campus
• St. Luke’s Easton Campus
• St. Luke’s Miners Campus
• St. Luke’s Monroe Campus
• St. Luke’s Upper Bucks Campus
• St. Luke’s Warren Campus
• Geisinger St. Luke’s Hospital

Remarkably, of Pennsylvania’s 189 eligible hospitals, nearly half of the 21 that earned five stars were St. Luke’s hospitals.

St. Luke’s Carbon Campus, eligible to be rated for the first time since it opened in 2021, received the four stars. St. Luke’s Orthopedic Hospital at its West End Campus was not rated by CMS because it is too new.

A CMS tool — called Hospital Compare — is a consumer-oriented website that provides information on how well hospitals provide recommended care to their patients. The star ratings and other information provided by the tool can help consumers make informed decisions about where to go for health care.

 

About St. Luke’s

Founded in 1872, St. Luke’s University Health Network (SLUHN) is a fully integrated, regional, non-profit network of more than 20,000 employees providing services at 15 campuses and 350+ outpatient sites.  With annual net revenue of $3.4 billion, the Network’s service area includes 11 counties in two states: Lehigh, Northampton, Berks, Bucks, Carbon, Montgomery, Monroe, Schuylkill and Luzerne counties in Pennsylvania and Warren and Hunterdon counties in New Jersey. St. Luke’s hospitals operate the largest network of trauma centers in Pennsylvania, with the Bethlehem Campus being home to St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital.

Dedicated to advancing medical education, St. Luke’s is the preeminent teaching hospital in central-eastern Pennsylvania.  In partnership with Temple University, the Network established the Lehigh Valley’s first and only four-year medical school campus.  It also operates the nation’s oldest School of Nursing, established in 1884, and 52 fully accredited graduate medical educational programs with more than 500 residents and fellows. In 2022, St. Luke’s, a member of the Children’s Hospital Association, opened the Lehigh Valley’s first and only free-standing facility dedicated entirely to kids.

SLUHN is the only Lehigh Valley-based health care system to earn Medicare’s five-star ratings (the highest) for quality, efficiency and patient satisfaction.  It is both a Leapfrog Group and Healthgrades Top Hospital and a Newsweek World’s Best Hospital.  The Network’s flagship University Hospital has earned the 100 Top Major Teaching Hospital designation from Fortune/PINC AI 10 years in a row, including in 2023 when it was identified as THE #4 TEACHING HOSPITAL IN THE COUNTRY.  In 2021, St. Luke’s was identified as one of the 15 Top Health Systems nationally.  Utilizing the Epic electronic medical record (EMR) system for both inpatient and outpatient services, the Network is a multi-year recipient of the Most Wired award recognizing the breadth of the SLUHN’s information technology applications such as telehealth, online scheduling and online pricing information.  The Network is also recognized as one of the state’s lowest-cost providers.

 

Information provided to TVL by:
Sam Kennedy