Shands Jacksonville Honored as ''Rising Star'' Among Academic Medical Centers

Shands Jacksonville has been named a "Rising Star" by the University Healthsystem Consortium, a national alliance of academic medical centers and affiliated hospitals. The honor recognizes significant improvements and exemplary performance in patient safety, mortality, clinical effectiveness, and equity of care as defined in UHC’s Quality and Accountability Study.

To receive a "Rising Star" designation, an organization has to move up 20 spots in UHC's annual hospital rankings. UHC has awarded Shands Jacksonville 4 stars, rating the hospital 19th out of 116 academic medical centers, up from 44 the previous year.

David S. Guzick, M.D., Ph.D., president of UF&Shands and chair of the Shands Jacksonville Board of Directors, was thrilled to learn of the Rising Star award: "At UF&Shands Jacksonville, our patients are at the center of all we do, and the quality of their care is Job 1. This award, which places Shands Jacksonville among the quality leaders of academic health centers nationally, is wonderful recognition of the partnership between our UF faculty and Shands. This has been a true team effort—faculty physicians, Shands nurses and all other clinical and administrative personnel—all working towards the single goal of achieving the best possible outcome for our patients."

"This is another example of how dedicated the employees of Shands Jacksonville and the University of Florida College of Medicine are to their patients and the communities in northeast Florida," said Jim Burkhart, MHA, FACHE, president and CEO of Shands Jacksonville. "We strive every day to provide the best patient care, and are honored and delighted to accept this recognition."

Shands Jacksonville was one of four organizations nationwide to receive the designation. Duke University Hospital, the Medical University of South Carolina and the Cleveland Clinic were also named Rising Stars. All four centers were honored Thursday during a UHC conference in Orlando.

Shands Jacksonville and the UF College of Medicine jointly provide services at centers throughout the region, including an academic medical center, community clinics, the UF Proton Therapy Institute, and the region’s only Level I trauma center.

"Shands Jacksonville deserves to be singled out for the highest-quality care and superb services they provide to our entire community," said Daniel R. Wilson, M.D., Ph.D., vice president for health affairs and dean of the UF College of Medicine–Jacksonville. "Our physicians and staff are proud to work hand in hand with the dedicated caregivers at Shands. They deserve this recognition as one of the best hospitals in America."

Said Irene M. Thompson, UHC president and chief executive officer, "UHC congratulates these hospitals for successfully focusing on health care quality and accountability improvement. This Rising Star achievement is especially notable because other academic medical centers are also working in earnest to improve patient safety and quality, and thus it has become quite difficult to stand out among more than 100 peer organizations."

UHC's Quality and Accountability Study was designed to help academic medical centers identify structures and practices that are associated with high performance in quality and safety.