11-07-2025
Mercy Medical Center in Aurora gets high grades from another national group
Mercy Medical Center in Aurora has received high grades from yet another national group after big changes and challenges at the hospital.
The Lown Institute, an independent health care think tank, gave Mercy Medical an overall 'A' on its 2025–26 Hospitals Index. The grade measures the hospital's 'social responsibility' through metrics about equity, value and patient outcomes.
'We're honored to be recognized by the Lown Institute,' Fernando Gruta, CEO at Mercy Medical Center, said in a news release. 'Our team remains committed to continuously focusing on delivering safe, equitable care to all we serve.'
Mercy Medical also recently received top marks for the spring 2025 period from hospital watchdog The Leapfrog Group. Detailed breakdowns of the scoring showed that the hospital performed at or above the national average in most areas.
However, like those given by Leapfrog, the Lown Institute's grade of the hospital may not necessarily capture what is currently going on at Mercy Medical Center. Both organizations based their grading on data collected in 2024 or earlier, but the hospital has recently gone through some big changes.
Perhaps the largest of the changes at Mercy Medical was Prime Healthcare's purchase of it and several other hospitals from Ascension in March.
In addition to the change in leadership, Mercy has also been dealing with the loss of a significant number of doctors after Advocate Healthcare slowly pulled out of the hospital over the past year or more. Then, in April, the hospital lost its Level II Trauma Center designation over allegations of understaffing.
Hospital officials have said that, despite the changes, Mercy Medical Center continues to provide health care services including emergency and critical care without any gaps in coverage.
A news release from Prime Healthcare recently said Mercy's top grades from both The Leapfrog Group and the Lown Institute 'highlight a strong, sustained commitment to patient-centered, high-quality care.'
Up to 54 metrics were compiled to create the Lown Institute's scoring of a hospital, according to the organization's website. From those metrics, scores were given to specific categories like 'pay equity' or 'avoiding overuse' which then contributed to broader grades of a hospital's equity, value and outcomes, plus combined into an overall social responsibility score.
For its broader grades, Mercy Medical Center received an 'A' in equity, a 'B' in value and a 'B' in patient outcomes.
Within the equity category, Mercy saw an 'A' in each category: Pay equity, which measured the difference between executive and low-level worker compensation; community benefit, which measured the hospital's investment in free care and community health; and inclusivity, which measured how demographically similar patients were to those who live in the surrounding community.
In the value category, the hospital received a 'D' in avoiding overuse, which measured how often the hospital did inappropriate tests or procedures with little benefit, but an 'A' in cost efficiency, which measured outcomes as compared to cost.
For the outcomes category, Mercy Medical got an 'A' in clinical outcomes, which measured how well the hospital kept patients alive and prevented return trips, and a 'B' in patient satisfaction, which measured patients' self-reported experience with the hospital, but received a 'D' in patient safety, which measured preventable safety errors.
Overall, Mercy Medical Center ranked in the top quarter of acute care hospitals nationwide and as the 15th best acute care hospital in the state.
Prime Healthcare's news release about the results said Mercy stands out among the other hospitals in the Lown Institute's Hospitals Index for 'its commitment to delivering high-quality, equitable care.'
Rush Copley Medical Center, the other hospital in Aurora, received an overall 'B' ranking for its social responsibility. It received a 'B' in equity, a 'C' in value and an 'A' in outcomes.
