St. Luke’s named one of the nation’s 100 Top Hospitals

St. Luke’s Hospital is one of only two hospitals in the state named one of the nation's 100 Top Hospitals by Thomson Reuters, the nation's leading source of healthcare information. The award recognizes hospitals that have achieved excellence in quality of care, operational efficiency, financial performance and growth. This is the third time St. Luke’s has received this distinction. According to Thomson Reuters, it is difficult to be selected as a national benchmark hospital every year. Research has shown hospitals that win this award three or more times have particularly high levels of performance over many years.

The 100 Top Hospitals: National Benchmarks study evaluated nearly 3,000 acute care, non-federal hospitals, including St. Luke’s, in 10 areas: mortality, medical complications, patient safety, average length of stay, expenses, profitability, patient satisfaction, adherence to clinical standards of care, and post-discharge mortality and readmission rates for acute heart attacks, heart failure and pneumonia. The study then compared St. Luke’s performance against similarly-sized hospitals across the country. Hospitals do not apply, pay for, or complete a survey to receive this award.

“This distinction is a testament to the caliber of our medical and clinical staff as well as our initiative as an organization to provide exceptional healthcare to eastern Iowans,” said Ted Townsend, St. Luke’s President and CEO. “Each member of our organization – doctors, employees, board members, volunteers and administrators – played a key role in helping us achieve this recognition.”
The study also found that if all Medicare inpatients throughout the country received the same level of care as those treated in these 100 Top Hospitals award winners, including St. Luke’s, then:

  • 98,000 additional patients would survive each year.
  • About 197,000 patient complications would be avoided annually.
  • Expenses would decrease $5.5 billion a year.
  • The average patient stay would decrease by nearly half a day.


Visit www.100tophospitals.com to read the entire 100 Top Hospitals: National Benchmarks study. In addition to St. Luke’s, the Finley Hospital in Dubuque also received Top 100 Hospital status. Hospitals do not apply, pay for, or complete a survey to receive this award.