Five Palm Beach County-based hospitals have filed a federal lawsuit against the nonprofit Leapfrog Group, accusing the watchdog group of publishing misleading safety rankings.
According to the lawsuit, Leapfrog Group pressures hospitals to volunteer their data and pay for memberships. The claims indicate that Leapfrog's highest-rated hospitals are paying members, according to the Miami Herald.
Leapfrog disputes the allegations, saying it uses voluntarily reported data and external sources like the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
The hospitals filing the lawsuit are Good Samaritan Medical Center, Delray Medical Center, Palm Beach Gardens Medical Center, West Boca Medical Center and St. Mary’s Medical Center.
Each hospital is owned by the for-profit company, Tenet Healthcare.
The hospitals want over $75,000 in damages, for Leapfrog to cease grading them and for the recent grades to be removed from Leapfrog's safety report cards.
"Leapfrog’s so-called grades are not grounded in credible science or independent analysis – they are riddled with falsehoods, distorted by undisclosed financial incentives, and misused to pressure hospitals and mislead the public," the hospitals say in a statement online. "This is not transparency – it’s a marketing scheme masquerading as public health advocacy."
In a statement on Leapfrog's website, CEO Leah Binder said the hospitals are "performing far worse than other hospitals across the country in protecting their patients from preventable errors and accidents" and are trying to "suppress publication of their grades"
Binder's statement said a safety grade of F was given to Delray, West Boca and Palm Beach Gardens; and a grade of D was given to Good Samaritan and St. Mary's.
"This is critical information for the public they serve," Binder said of the grades.
However, the hospitals claim Leapfrog “rigged its methodology” to punish hospitals that didn’t provide data for patient safety surveys by giving them failing grades.
The lawsuit was filed April 30 in the U.S. Southern District Court of Florida in West Palm Beach.
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