Four Organizations Honored with the 2001 Baldrige National Quality Award

Three health care organizations and one nonprofit business won the 2011 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, the nation’s highest presidential honor for performance excellence through innovation, improvement, and visionary leadership. This marks the first year that three health care organizations have been selected at one time.

The 2011 Baldrige Award recipients—listed with their category—are:

·               Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, Missouri (nonprofit)

·               Henry Ford Health System, Detroit, Michigan (health care)

·               Schneck Medical Center, Seymour, Indiana. (health care)

·               Southcentral Foundation, Anchorage, Alaska (health care)

“With innovative practices, an unwavering commitment to excellence, dynamic management, and proven results, the four organizations recognized today with the 2011 Baldrige Award will serve as role models—not only for their peers in the health care, nonprofit and business sectors—but for every American organization that strives for a higher standard of performance and never settles for second-best,” said U.S. Commerce Secretary John Bryson.

The 2011 Baldrige Award recipients were selected from a field of 69 applicants. All of the applicants were evaluated rigorously by an independent board of examiners in seven areas defined by the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence: leadership; strategic planning; customer focus; measurement, analysis, and knowledge management; work force focus; operations focus; and results. The evaluation process for each of the recipients included about 1,000 hours of review and an on-site visit by a team of examiners to clarify questions and verify information in the applications.

Concordia Publishing House (CPH) is the publishing arm of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS). It was founded in 1869 to provide members of the LCMS with Christian ministry resources for worship, education, and nurturing of their faith. Today, the company provides more than 8,000 products in a variety of formats and languages. CPH has a work force of 247 employees and revenues of $35 million. Its overall customer satisfaction scores are 98 percent, exceeding levels set forth by the annual Purdue University Benchmark Study of U.S. Call Centers. CPH’s Customer Call Center—ranked as a Center of Excellence by Purdue University in 2009, 2010, and 2011—provides same-day response to customers through separate phone queues for product lines, multilingual customer representatives, and e-mail contacts.

CPH uses voice of the customer procedures to gather input from customers for compliments, product ideas, and complaints. Core Product Teams analyze customer data, prioritize product/service offerings, and design products to meet customer requirements and exceed their expectations.

Henry Ford Health System’s (HFHS) performance on core measures publicly reported for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is at the 90th percentile for 75 percent of the reporting areas across the system’s seven inpatient hospitals. It has maintained a positive net operating income of greater than $25 million per year from 2007 to 2010 despite significant increases in uncompensated care, which grew from approximately $130 million in 2007 to approximately $200 million in 2010. In 2011, HFHS’s Health Alliance Plan was rated number one for member satisfaction among all health insurance plans in Michigan by J.D. Power and Associates and its community support activities contributed an overall economic benefit to southeast Michigan of $5.8 billion in 2010.

Schneck Medical Center’s (SMC) patient satisfaction surveys meet or exceed the top 10 percent or top 25 percent levels on nine of 10 Press Ganey (a national consulting firm focused on improving health care performance) measures, including inpatient quality of care, inpatient family support, inpatient coordination of care, and inpatient customer service.

SMC demonstrates excellence in measures of its operating margin, cash flow, and cash position, with its reported results comparing favorably to the Standard & Poor’s “A” and “AA” levels. From 2008 to 2010, SMC’s gross revenue results showed growth in its strategic focus areas—women’s health, joint replacement, noninvasive cardiac care, cancer care, and bariatric surgery.

  Southcentral Foundation’s (SCF) unique Nuka System of Care is a relationship-based health care delivery system. Nuka’s organizational strategies and processes; medical, behavioral, dental, and traditional practices; and supporting infrastructure work in partnership with Alaska’s native community to support physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual wellness. The system is owned, managed, directed, designed, and driven by Alaska native people.

In 2010, SCF achieved the highest level of Patient-Centered Medical Home recognition from the National Committee on Quality Assurance (NCQA) for creating a strong primary care system that engages customer-owners and offers a broad range of preventive services and treatment.

Overall, SCF has achieved significant improvements in a number of key areas, including same-day access to care which has led to a 50-percent decrease in costly emergency room and urgent care visits, a decrease in specialty care by about 65 percent, a decrease in primary care visits by 20 percent, and a decrease in hospital admissions by 53 percent.

Overall staff turnover has decreased from 37 percent in 2008 to 17 percent in 2011. Turnover rates for Alaska native and American Indian employees (who make up 53 percent of the SCF work force) for the same period decreased from 29 percent to 15 percent.

The 2011 Baldrige Award recipients will be presented with their awards at an April 2012 ceremony in Washington, D.C. For more information, visit www.nist.gov/baldrige.