Myrtle Beach, SC (April 30, 2020) – Grand Strand Medical Center was, once again, awarded an 'A' grade from The Leapfrog Group's Spring 2020 Hospital Safety Grade for the fourth time in a row. The designation recognizes the hospital's focus in protecting patients from harm and providing safer healthcare services. The Leapfrog Group is a national organization committed to improving health care quality and safety for consumers and purchasers. The Safety Grade assigns an 'A', 'B', 'C', 'D' or 'F' grade to hospitals across the country based on their performance in preventing medical errors, injuries, accidents, infections and other harms to patients in their care.

"Maintaining a safe environment is always a top priority for all of our colleagues," states Dr. Andrew Schwartz, Chief Medical Officer of Grand Strand Health. "Given the tremendous work that all medical systems are doing to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, we are honored to be awarded an 'A' grade once again as a testament of the effort our teams invest each day in making sure our patients' health and safety is a top priority to receive the care they deserve."

Developed under the guidance of a National Expert Panel, the Leapfrog Hospital Safety Grade uses 28 measures of publicly available hospital safety data to assign grades to more than 2,600 U.S. hospitals twice per year. The Hospital Safety Grade's methodology is peer-reviewed and fully transparent, and the results are free to the public. To see full grade details and to access patient tips for staying safe in the hospital, visit www.hospitalsafetygrade.org.