Media Release

Contact: Dennis Mathis, Public Relations Coordinator, San Juan Regional Medical Center, 505-609-2238 or email dmathis@sjrmc.net

FARMINGTON, NM (September 17, 2008) San Juan Regional Medical Center was recently named as one of the nation's top performance improvement leaders in a study done by Thomson Reuters, a firm that analyzes healthcare organizations. The local hospital was recognized as one of a hundred hospitals making the greatest progress in improving hospital-wide performance for five consecutive years (2002-2006). The 2007 Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospital Performance Improvement leaders were chosen based on a number of criteria that included patient mortality, medical complications, patient safety, length of stay, financial management, and use of evidence-based medicine.

"It's an honor to receive this recognition," said Steve Altmiller, CEO and president of San Juan Regional Medical Center. "The selection speaks to our quality of care and the commitment of our staff. Quality improvement and measurement are constant at San Juan Regional—not for the recognition, but for the patient. Still, we're proud that our efforts have been recognized in this way."

Findings from the Thomson Reuters study appears in the August 11, 2008 issue of Modern Healthcare magazine. The study analyzed acute care hospitals nationwide using detailed data from the years 2002-2006, including publicly available Medicare MedPAR data, Medicare cost reports, and Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) outpatient data. Researchers evaluated 2,867 short-term, acute care, non-federal hospitals grouped into five categories: major teaching hospitals, other teaching hospitals, large community hospitals, medium-sized community hospitals, and small community hospitals. San Juan Regional and 19 other hospitals were selected in the medium-sized community hospital category.