HOBART | St. Mary Medical Center on Monday was named a top-performing U.S. hospitals for patient safety.

Health care ratings company HealthGrades said the hospital ranked in the top 5 percent of nearly 5,000 hospitals studied.

Patient safety has emerged as a chief concern for hospitals, costing the federal Medicare program $8.8 billion and resulting in nearly 240,000 preventable deaths between 2004 and 2006, HealthGrades' Scott Shapiro said in a prepared release.

With Medicare and Medicaid programs scheduled to stop reimbursing hospitals for the treatment of many preventable errors, "the financial implications for hospitals are substantial," Shapiro said.

"St. Mary Medical Center is among those hospitals leading the way to reduce these costly errors and improve patient care ... ," HealthGrades chief medical officer Samantha Collier said.

HealthGrades analyzed 41 million Medicare patient records to identify the hospitals whose patient-safety incidents were among the lowest 5 percent in the nation.

The company studied patient safety incidents in 16 areas, including cases of objects being left in bodies after surgery and certain post-surgery infections.

The 249 hospitals named as top performers will be used as a benchmark against which other hospitals can be evaluated.

The 2008 Distinguished Hospital for Patient Safety designation was the fourth in four years for St. Mary, the hospital said.

"We've adopted new practices, revised existing ones and reinforced those already working in order to keep safety at the forefront of our care," St. Mary Medical Center administrator Janice Ryba said.