Leapfrog Recognizes "Tele-Intensivists" Under Safety Practice Standards April 28th, 2004 Employer coalition the Leapfrog Group will now recognize "tele-intensivists" who remotely monitor patients using electronic methods as meeting its patient safety goal to staff the intensive care unit with Intensivists, the group announced Tuesday. The Intensivist staffing standard is one of three hospital safety practices recognized by Leapfrog; the other two are the use of computerized physician order entry and evidence-based hospital referrals. Leapfrog also on Tuesday announced a set of 27 new patient safety guidelines, which, in combination with the three existing standards, will be used to provide consumers with rankings of hospitals nationwide. The new safety practices are based on guidelines developed by the National Quality Forum. Previously, Leapfrog only ranked urban hospitals on its three safety practices, but it is inviting rural hospitals to respond to its new survey (Leapfrog Group press release, 4/27). Leapfrog will post the information by state on its web site, and hospitals can update the survey monthly. The standards will measure additional safety efforts, including what is being done to prevent incidents such as X-ray mix-ups, wrong-site surgeries and medication errors. The survey will give hospitals an overall score for these measures, and then a total score based on the three existing measures. The scores will separate hospitals into four groups, ranging from those that fully meet the standards to those that are willing to report on their progress (iHealthBeat, 4/22). Hospitals will be able to earn partial credit for a safety practice simply by committing to work in that area (Morrisey, Modern Healthcare, 4/27).