Mercy Health – Tiffin Hospital named as top Small Community Hospital on Fortune/IBM Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals® List

Tiffin Hospital recently has been named to the Fortune/IBM Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals® list. This is the first time Mercy Health – Tiffin Hospital has been recognized with this honor as the top performing small community hospital in the U.S. The annual list was published recently by Fortune https://fortune.com/2021/04/27/top-community-hospitals-2021-ibm-watson-health/.

IBM Watson Health has identified the top hospitals from a rigorous evaluation of 2,675 short-term, acute care, non-federal hospitals in the U.S. The annual list recognizes excellence in clinical outcomes, operational efficiency, patient experience, and financial health. IBM Watson Health established the list to help identify best practices that may help other healthcare organizations achieve consistent, balanced, and sustainable high performance.

“Not only was Mercy Health – Tiffin Hospital among the nation’s best but it was named as the number one top Small Community Hospital in the country. This is a much-deserved recognition for a team that has provided top quality and compassionate care to the residents of Tiffin and Seneca County for more than 100 years,” said Bob Baxter, president, Mercy Health – Toledo.

This year’s ranking of top hospitals also introduces a measure of hospitals’ contributions to community health with a focus on equity developed by a team of experts at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Equity and the Bloomberg American Health Initiative at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

For the ranking, hospitals were surveyed across three components: 1) assessing hospital contributions to community health as a provider of critical services for community health and preventive care; 2) identifying ways that hospitals contribute to community health as a community partner teaming up with local organizations to implement critical programs; and 3) focusing on ways that hospitals promote community health through their practices as anchor institutions supporting local economic and social progress. Hospitals received credit for meeting a certain number of best practice standards in each component as part of the survey scoring and the new measure led to a change in ranking for more than one-third of the 100 hospitals. 

“Mercy Health – Tiffin Hospital consistently has been recognized for the excellent care they provide to the families in our region every day. We are proud of the work they do and the continue to do,” said Daniel Barbee, Mercy Health -Toledo Rural Market president. “Despite an unprecedented year in health care history, this team remained committed to caring for our patients in a way that is nationally recognized and ranked.”

Established in 1913 with the mission of healing sick and injured residents, Mercy Health – Tiffin Hospital now employs more than 400 associates and offers several specialty services including a birthing center; emergency room; imaging center -- including mammography, CT,  nuclear medicine, PET Scan – cardiology services; inpatient and outpatient surgery; cancer care; and physical therapy including pediatric therapy. In 2020, Tiffin Hospital was named to Newsweek’s 2020 list of Best Maternity Care Hospitals -- a distinction that recognizes facilities that have excelled in providing care to mothers, newborns and their families, as verified by the 2019 Leapfrog Hospital Survey.

This most recent recognition demonstrates Mercy Health – Tiffin Hospital’s ongoing commitment to prioritize patient-centered care. According to IBM Watson Health, as compared to similar hospitals, the hospitals included on the Fortune/IBM Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals list had better results on key clinical and operational performance indicators. These include survival rates, patient complications, healthcare associated infections, 30-day mortality and 30-day hospital-wide readmission rates, length of stay, throughput in emergency departments, inpatient expenses, profitability and ratings from patients.

“We are proud of all of the hospitals, health systems and their dedicated clinicians and staff included among the Fortune/IBM Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals,” said Irene Dankwa-Mullan, MD, MPH, Chief Health Equity Officer and Deputy Chief Health officer at IBM Watson Health. “From small community hospitals to major teaching hospitals, organizations on this list demonstrate a relentless commitment to high value, patient-centered care and innovation. They also recognize the importance of contributing to the health of their communities and we applaud them for their programs that help provide equitable quality care and address health disparities.”

 For more information, visit http://www.100tophospitals.com/.