County nurse says it's not too late for flu shotsMarie Christine WillsonTwo mountain lions harvested in Pine RidgeCounty to consider new emergency manager, close 2013 booksEllsworth AFB says malfunction that led to August http://www.broncosnflofficialproshop.com/Nike-Malik-Jackson-Jersey.html B 1B crash was an anomalyFundraising campaign to build new Sanford www.broncosnflofficialproshop.com/Nike-Duke-Ihenacho-Jersey.html Science Education CenterBHSU explores cultures during international fairBase briefsa 010314Rapid City Regional Hospital is criticizing a national non profit group after it ranked the hospital as one of the least safe in the nation and the worst in South Dakota. Rapid City Regional earned the lowest marks of the eight hospitals the organization surveyed in South Dakota and was one of only 148 in the country that earned a "D" grade.Erica Mobley, a spokeswoman for Leapfrog, said that the hospital scored Andre Johnson Navy Jersey poorly in a number of areas. Rapid City Regional had more incidents of foreign objects left inside patients after surgery than the national average. In addition, it had an unusually high number of accidental cuts and tears from medical treatment. The group also pointed to significantly fewer physicians working in its Intensive Care Unit than other hospitals."It doesn't appear that this hospital employs intensivists up to the standard," Mobley said.Those criticisms have rankled nerves at Rapid City Regional. CEO Tim Sughrue declined to be interviewed on Thursday but released a statement that criticized Leapfrog Group and its methodology."A number of major healthcare organizations, such as the American Hospital Association, are extremely critical of the Leapfrog Group," he stated. "This is illustrated by hospitals in Missouri and Texas who have successfully challenged the Leapfrog Group. The Leapfrog Group has been forced to withdraw safety grades because of incorrect data, incomplete data and partial data."Sughrue said that he believed that Rapid City Regional received a D grade because it chose not to complete a survey Leapfrog had sent the hospital."We are sure that hospitals who do not participate and, thereby, fail to support the business model of Leapfrog, are scored lower than those hospitals who do participate in the Andre Johnson Authentic Jersey survey," he wrote.But on Friday, Leah Binder, Leapfrog's president and CEO, disputed Sughrue's comment, which she called misinformed and inaccurate."Mr Sughrue is certainly entitled to his own opinion but he's not entitled to his own facts," she said. "And he has made several factual misstatements."Binder said her organization has never been forced to withdraw safety grades."That's absolutely false," she said. "That never happened, so I don't know where he got that idea, but it's wrong."Binder added that Leapfrog is a non profit, not a business, and its ranking methodology was developed voluntarily by a panel of national experts in patient safety. Those safety experts include Dr. Peter Pronovost, head of the Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality at Johns Hopkins Medicine in Baltimore, and Dr. Arnold Milstein, professor of medicine at Stanford University.Binder said each hospital grade is based on a combination of data, from a voluntary survey to publicly available data. If a hospital chooses not to complete a survey, it doesn't affect its overall grade. More than half of the 780 hospitals that were awarded "A" grades by Leapfrog did not complete the Danny Trevathan Womens Jersey organization's survey."These experts did not want there to be a bias towards hospitals that complete the Leapfrog survey, so there isn't one," she said.Leapfrog has been ranking hospitals since June last year and updates its rankings every six months. Rapid City Regional initially earned a "C," but that fell to a "D" in November and remained a "D" in its newest round of rankings last month.Binder said that when the organization first began ranking hospitals it spurred a defensive reaction from providers that scored poorly. A year later, she said, most low scoring hospitals were now asking the organization what they could do to improve.She said Rapid City Regional's response was surprisingly defensive compared to other "D" ranked hospitals."The numbers speak for themselves. They have a lot of work to do to deliver the level of safety that the people in your community deserve," she said.Despite Rapid City Regional's low marks, Leapfrog said it doesn't want patients to avoid the hospital. Mobley stressed that in an emergency situation, a patient should head immediately to the nearest hospital."What we really hope people will do with this information is talk to their doctor and ask what Danny Trevathan Kids Jersey the doctor and hospital is doing to make sure they are safe during a hospital stay," she said.