Each June, the National Safety Council (NSC) observes National Safety Month, to raise awareness about the leading causes of preventable injury and death. While safety is a year-round priority, this annual campaign shines a spotlight on areas where proactive measures can make a life-saving difference. It also highlights the efforts the entire team at Northern Arizona Healthcare (NAH) makes to ensure continuous hospital safety, a complex, ever-evolving challenge that affects patients, health care workers and the community.
Why Hospital Safety Matters
Hospitals are places of healing, but they can also pose risks if safety protocols are not rigorously followed. According to the World Health Organization, unsafe medical care causes at least one death every minute globally. In the U.S. alone, medical errors are estimated to be the third leading cause of death, following heart disease and cancer. From falls and infections to medication errors and workplace injuries, the potential hazards in a hospital setting are numerous.
National Safety Month is an opportunity for hospitals and health care organizations to review protocols, enhance staff training and engage patients in safety initiatives. It also serves as a reminder that safety in health care settings is not optional, it is essential.
Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grades
The Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade is a nationally recognized rating system designed to help patients make informed decisions about their health care. Published twice a year by The Leapfrog Group, a nonprofit watchdog organization, these grades reflect how well hospitals protect patients from preventable harm and medical error.
Leapfrog assigns letter grades to over 3,000 general hospitals across the country based on more than 30 measures of patient safety. These include rates of infections, surgical errors, safety practices, staffing levels and the use of computerized systems to reduce medication errors. Data is drawn from sources like the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the American Hospital Association and Leapfrog’s own hospital survey.
Both NAH hospitals, Flagstaff Medical Center (FMC) and Verde Valley Medical Center, each earned an ‘A’ Hospital Safety Grade for Spring 2025 from The Leapfrog Group. This is the fifth consecutive ‘A’ rating for FMC.
A hospital earning an ‘A’ grade demonstrates a strong commitment to safety and quality of care. These institutions typically have lower rates of hospital-acquired infections, effective leadership in preventing errors and protocols in place to handle emergencies. In contrast, hospitals receiving lower grades may have gaps in their systems or track records that reflect increased risk of complications or harm.
The award is an independent testament to the care NAH provides patients in our community, as achieving an ‘A’ Hospital Safety Grade reflects enormous dedication to patient safety. It is so important to have a safe work environment in a hospital setting, for both the patients and the staff, and to see our colleagues at FMC recognized for properly executing best-in-class safety protocols shows the level of commitment that NAH has when it comes to providing exceptional care to our patients.
Key Areas of Hospital Safety
Hospital safety encompasses several key areas, all of which are vital to delivering high-quality, reliable care:
- Patient safety includes practices aimed at reducing harm from medical errors, infections, and falls.
- Workplace safety for health care staff – health care workers face a higher-than-average risk of occupational injury, including exposure to infectious diseases, musculoskeletal injuries from lifting patients, needlestick injuries and even workplace violence.
- Emergency preparedness – natural disasters, pandemics, and mass casualty events underscore the need for hospitals to be ready for emergencies.
Improving hospital safety isn’t just about protocols, it’s about creating a culture of safety. This starts at the top, with leadership committing to transparency, accountability and continuous improvement. Hospitals that excel in safety often foster an environment where staff feel empowered to report errors without fear of punishment, communication across disciplines is open and encouraged, and performance data is tracked, analyzed and used to make informed improvements. NAH follows all of these protocols, which is why we are consistently awarded ‘A’ grades in hospital safety.
Hospital safety is a cornerstone of quality health care. During National Safety Month, hospitals foster a culture where safety is ingrained in every action, every day. By prioritizing safety in June, and every day of the year, we protect lives, build trust, and move closer to a health care system where harm is the exception, not the rule. For more than 50 years, NAH has remained committed to providing the highest quality health care to our patients and communities in northern Arizona, and it will continue to do so for the next 50 years.
If you are interested in submitting a question for Northern Arizona Healthcare, please submit it to [email protected]. We will choose one question per month and one of our experts at NAH will answer the question in this column