Magazine recognizes hospital's heart care

Regional Medical Center Bayonet Point made Money magazine's nationwide list of best hospitals for heart care.

HUDSON - Money magazine this week named Regional Medical Center Bayonet Point one of the nation's best hospitals for heart care in several categories this week.

Bayonet Point was the only Florida hospital recognized for its work treating heart attacks.

In addition, the Hudson facility, was one of two hospitals in the state ranked for its interventional cardiology procedures and was one of three in Florida named for its record with valve replacement surgery.

"This is a testimony to our physicians as well as our hospital staff," said hospital CEO Dave Williams.

Bayonet Point is home to the Heart Institute at Regional Medical Center, the largest center for open heart surgery on the state's west coast. As of the end of September, the institute performed some 772 open heart surgeries and 7,500 this year. More than 58,000 of the procedures have been done since the institute opened 12 years ago.

That kind of volume is part of what launched Bayonet Point onto the magazine's list according to Denver-Based HealthGrades, the company that compiled the data for Money magazine's report using factors including Medicare data on mortality and complication rates.

"In medical research there is a strong correlation between quality and volume," said Sarah Loughran, senior vice president of HealthGrades, which gathers information on all the nation's hospitals and ranks them with one, three or five stars. Money requested the top five, five-star hospitals by volume, she said. The fall 2003 special report issue of the magazine is on newsstands now.

In late September, Regional Medical Center made Solucient's Top 100 Hospitals list in the large Community Hospitals (250-plus acute-care beds) category. Solucient analyzes health care data.

Regional Medical Center Bayonet Point was the only hospital in Citrus, Hernando, Pasco, Hillsborough and Pinellas counties acknowledged in the industry study that recognizes hospitals for excellence in quality of care, operational efficiency, financial efficiency and adaptation to the environment.

The recognition marks the sixth time the hospital was recognized by Solucient.

"When it rains it pours," said Kurt Conover, the hospital's director of business development. "We've been really busy but we've done really well."

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