SPRINGFIELD, July 11 — Baystate Medical Center garnered national recognition as one of the country’s best hospitals for the second year in a row, as the annual hospital rankings compiled by U.S. News and World Report placed Baystate in the top 173 of more than 5,400 medical centers nationwide. Baystate’s Medical and Surgical Endocrinology programs led the hospital to the distinction, placing alongside some of the best endocrinology programs in the United States.

“This honor serves as a tribute to the hard work, dedication and teamwork of the doctors, nurses and staff in our endocrinology and bariatric surgery departments—as well as our pathology and clinical laboratory colleagues--and to those who laid the foundation for this success in years past,” said Dr. J. Enrique Silva, chief of the Baystate Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism.  “It’s very gratifying to receive this national recognition, especially in a specialty as important as endocrinology to the community we serve. In addition, it’s an added stimulus to continue our mission, to reach out to the community for preventive interventions, and to continue to develop groundbreaking research in this field of medicine.”

The body’s endocrine system, through the many hormones it produces, is an essential regulator of metabolism and tissue function. The national recognition of Baystate’s Division of Endocrinology is even more meaningful, said Dr. Silva, because while Massachusetts at large is being affected as the rest of the nation by the “overwhelming” increase in obesity and diabetes, it is considerably higher in western Massachusetts than in the rest of the Commonwealth.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, there were three million more cases of diabetes in the past two years nationally, which brings the total close to 24 million--most of it Type II, the type associated with obesity. Locally, an estimated 55,000 people in the Pioneer Valley are living with diabetes, and one-third of them are undiagnosed, according to the American Diabetes Association. Statistics show that diabetes is the leading cause of blindness in Americans, as well as the leading cause of kidney failure and non-traumatic lower-limb amputation, and 73 percent of those living with diabetes have high blood pressure. Even more concerning, if the current explosion in diabetes and obesity continues, one in three children born in the year 2000 and beyond will develop diabetes in his or her lifetime.

“Obesity is a disease that knows no boundaries and affects many body systems, often resulting in diabetes and heart disease, and its care must be multidisciplinary and collaborative,” said Dr. John Romanelli, FACS, director of bariatric surgery at Baystate Medical Center. “We have a team of surgeons, endocrinologists, nephrologists and general-medicine physicians all sharing their resources and expertise in obesity care to further benefit our patients, and we are also conducting clinical research to determine why, after bariatric surgery, many patients are cured of their diabetes.”

Dr. Loring S. Flint, senior vice president, Medical Affairs, Baystate Health, noted the U.S. News rankings demonstrate Baystate is “a clinically excellent hospital.”

“We’re proud to be part of such a select group of care providers,” he said. “It means even more that our programs in endocrinology and obesity surgery are being particularly honored, since their work is so integral to our mission of improving the health of the people in our communities.”

Robert Smith, executive director of the American Diabetes Association in western Massachusetts, said he was “thrilled and proud” to hear the news about Baystate’s recognition. “The American Diabetes Association salutes Baystate Medical Center, an ADA-recognized program and our partner in the fight against diabetes in the Pioneer Valley, for this tremendous distinction,” said Smith.

Methodology

The U.S. News & World Report rankings, which are honoring Baystate for the second consecutive year, weigh three elements equally: reputation, death rate, and a set of care-related factors such as nursing and patient services. In 12 specialties, including endocrinology, hospitals have to pass through several gates to be ranked and considered a Best Hospital:

1. The first gate determines whether a hospital is eligible to be ranked at all by requiring that any of three conditions be met - to be a teaching hospital, to be affiliated with a teaching hospital, or to have at least six important medical technologies from a defined list of 13.

 

2. The second gate determines whether a hospital is eligible to be ranked in a particular specialty. To be eligible, the hospital had to either have at least a specified volume in certain procedures and conditions over three years, or had to have been nominated in our yearly specialist survey.

 

3. The third gate is whether a hospital does well enough to be ranked, based on its reputation, death rate, and factors like nurse staffing and technology.

“The America’s Best Hospitals rankings provide readers with trusted material during some of life’s most concerning times – hospitalization,” said Brian Kelly, editor of U.S.News & World Report. “Our rankings highlight the internal culture of excellence embraced by caregivers in the great hospitals throughout the United States.”

Standing Out

Baystate Medical Center is the only medical center in western Massachusetts to be recognized by U.S. News this year—the latest in a string of recent national honors for Baystate. In 2005, Baystate was designated a Magnet hospital for nursing excellence by the American Nurses Credentialing Center, and this year became the only hospital in the nation to win the Beacon Award for Critical Care Excellence four consecutive times. For the past two years, Baystate has been named one of the Leapfrog Group’s Top 50 hospitals in the country for safety, and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement has designated Baystate as a mentor hospital in its 5 Million Lives Campaign for superior performance and willingness to share innovations and practical ideas. Baystate reaffirmed its leadership in quality of care with the establishment this year of a new Center for Quality and Safety Research. The Center is collaborating with a wide range of partners inside and outside the Baystate Health system to achieve a deeper understanding of patient experiences and outcomes and to leverage that understanding to bring higher-quality and safer care to patients everywhere.