Carl Vinson VA Medical Center receives 4-star rating for overall quality of healthcare
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has a star rating system to help you choose a provider. The rating compares each provider’s overall quality of services. This year, the Carl Vinson VA Medical Center received its first CMS rating of 4 out of 5 stars.
DUBLIN, Georgia (41NBC/WMGT) – The Carl Vinson Veterans’ Administration Medical Center in Dublin wants veterans to know they have options when choosing a healthcare provider.
If you’re a veteran looking to compare hospitals in your area, The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, or CMS, has a star rating system to help you choose a provider.
The rating compares each provider’s overall quality of services. Factors such as mortality, readmission, and timely and effective care are measured, along with patient satisfaction surveys.
This year, the Carl Vinson VA Medical Center received its first CMS rating of 4 out of 5 stars. Executive Director, Manuel Davila, says it’s a huge accomplishment for the hospital’s first rating.
“It’s a culmination of all the efforts of the tremendous staff who are committed and engaged to high quality safe patient care for our veterans,” he said. “And all the long hours and tremendous work they have done to ensure that we get here.”
Gus Allbritton, a veteran and volunteer at the Medical Center, started receiving care there in 1991. He says that although it is a rural hospital, the Medical Center has evolved and improved its services over the years.
“It’s not only the quality of care that they provide, but it’s the quality of management that we have and the quality of employees, and in veterans,” Allbritton said.
Allbritton says the Carl Vinson VA offers a common connection among veterans that they might not be able to receive in community hospitals.
According to Davila, the Medical Center competes with all other hospitals in a service area of 49 counties. On medicare.gov, Fairview Park Hospital in Dublin received a rating of 5 stars.
While the Medical Center’s biggest challenge now is staffing shortages and patient volume, Davila says he is working to address those challenges by providing competitive pay to staff and expanding services such as women’s health, veteran housing and surgical procedures.
“Our veterans have a choice, and they have a choice to go out into the community or they have a choice to come to the VA. So then the question is why would they come to the VA?” Davila said. “The answer is because we provide high-quality, safe patient care.”
The Medical Center plans to add housing for homeless veterans to the Carl Vinson campus, along with a new women’s healthcare facility and a Fisher House for traveling veterans.
