Kaiser Permanente Rated Highest Again on California's Annual Clinical Quality Report Card

OAKLAND, Calif., March 28, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- For the fifth consecutive year, Kaiser Permanente is the only health plan in California to earn a 4-star rating — the highest possible — for overall quality of care in the annual Healthcare Quality Report Card from the California Office of the Patient Advocate.

Kaiser Permanente in both Northern and Southern California also received 4 stars in the "Patients Rate their HMO" category, which measures members' satisfaction with their total care and service.

"These ratings demonstrate the outstanding care and service that our plans provide," said Jed Weissberg, MD, senior vice president, Hospitals, Quality and Care Delivery Excellence, Kaiser Permanente. "Our consistent performance reflects our dedicated physicians, nurses and care teams. Delivering high-quality, affordable health care to our members and patients is our mission. It's what we strive to do every day."                          

The 2013 report card (online at http://www.opa.ca.gov/report_card/) provides California consumers with side-by-side comparisons of the largest health plans in the state (10 HMOs and six PPOs), ranking them on national standard-of-care measures that involve treatment and prevention of a range of acute and chronic conditions with significant implications for personal health.

The OPA redesigned the 2013 report card to make it easier to navigate. Wording in the report also was changed to make it more clear to consumers what specifically was being measured. Since last year, the National Committee for Quality Assurance, the premier organization measuring the performance of health-care providers in the United States, has been a partner with the OPA in developing the annual report card in California.

For more information, please read the Northern California and Southern California press releases.

The 2013 OPA ratings follow several other recent honors received by Kaiser Permanente:

• Kaiser Permanente's Medicare plans in California received a 5-star rating for 2013, the only health plan in the state to get the top rating and one of only 11 plans in the nation to get a 5-star rating from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. It was the second straight year Kaiser Permanente in California has received 5 stars.
• Seventeen Kaiser Permanente hospitals in Northern California and Southern California were named "Top Hospitals" in 2012 by The Leapfrog Group. Only 93 hospitals in the nation – of more than 1,200 surveyed – received this honor.
• Nearly all Kaiser Permanente hospitals in California received "A" grades in The Leapfrog Group's 2012 Hospital Safety Scores.
• Ten Kaiser Permanente hospitals in California were ranked as Top Performers in 2012 by The Joint Commission.

About Kaiser Permanente

Kaiser Permanente is committed to helping shape the future of health care. We are recognized as one of America's leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. Founded in 1945, our mission is to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to   improve the health of our members and the communities we serve. We currently serve more than 9 million members in nine states and the District of Columbia. Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal physicians, specialists and team of caregivers. Our expert and caring medical teams are empowered and supported by industry-leading technology advances and tools for health promotion, disease prevention, state-of-the-art care delivery   and world-class chronic disease management. Kaiser Permanente is dedicated to care innovations, clinical research, health education and the support of community health. For more information, go to: kp.org/newscenter.

Contact: Mark Camps, Kaiser Permanente, 510-625-5624

SOURCE Kaiser Permanente