Park Nicollet Snags National Honor

St. Louis Park's recently snagged some national recognition.

On Monday, the hospital was named one of the top-50 hospitals in the country for heart care, according to Thomson Reuters. It is the seventh time Park Nicollet has made the list.

Dr. Cynthia Toher, the hospital's cardiovascular medical director, said she and her staff were honored by the news.

"For me and our team, it's a recognition of the work we do every day for our patients," she said. "It's really about our ability to apply high-quality care at an affordable cost."

The analysis of top cardiovascular facilities looked at more than 1,000 hospitals. Thomson Reuters then pulled out those that were measurably better in areas of average cost, survival rate and readmission rate.

Overall, the study found that top-50 hospitals, like Park Nicollet, spent about $1,300 less per case then the average hospital. The top-50 also had significantly higher survival rates for patients in several categories as well as lower readmission rates. Patients at the top-50 hospitals also got back to their daily lives a half-day earlier, on average.

The broader view of the study is quite striking. Thomson Reuters found that if all the hospitals studied performed at the same level as the top-50 this past year, 7,500 additional lives would have been saved, 12,000 more patients would have been complication-free and $910 million would have been saved.

Though hospitals outside of the top-50 in cardiovascular care certainly have something to shoot for, Toher said even hospitals that made the list, like Park Nicollet, should strive to improve.

"I don't think there's a health care system in this country that can't deliver better service at a better price," she said.

Toher added that everyone in the cardiovascular field should be looking at ways to do this everyday.

"How do we do it better," she said of heart care, "and how do we do it in the most financially responsible way we can?"

Efforts along those lines will have a significant impact — cardiovascular disease is the longstanding No. 1 killer in the U.S., according to statistics, claiming nearly 2, 300 lives each day. The cost to combat that in hospitals across the country has been $155.7 billion so far this year, making it the most expensive condition that hospitals treat.