St. Luke's University Health Network recently accepted the 2015 100 Top Hospitals Award® from for Truven Health Analytics™ in a celebration shared with more than 200 managers, physicians and network leaders gathered in Laros Auditorium on the Bethlehem campus.

Jean Chenoweth, Truven's senior vice president for performance improvement and the 100 Top Hospitals program, presented the award to St. Luke's President and CEO Richard A. Anderson.

"The award-winning hospitals represent the highest national standards in hospital care and management today," Chenoweth said. "They set the benchmarks for peers around the country to follow."

"Your core measures are nearly perfect," she said, referring to the recommended treatments scientific evidence shows produce the best results.

"Your performance is stellar compared to your peers," she said.

Anderson accepted the award as he recognized the Network's 9,600 employees.

"This is truly an award for all of us and must be shared, most importantly, with the people who deliver that care and do the work that has cultivated so much pride in what we do," Anderson said.

It is St. Luke's third 100 Top Hospital award and the first in the "Major Teaching Hospitals" category. Among the 15 hospitals in the category, St. Luke's was listed with Emory, Duke and Stanford universities' and other major teaching hospitals.

"We are extremely proud to be listed among Truven's 100 Top Hospitals," St. Luke's Board Chairman Dr. Charles Saunders said.

"This distinction is the most comprehensive and rigorous measurement of top performing hospitals of its kind in the country. The hospitals in this list are objectively proven to provide the highest values to their communities," Saunders said.

The Truven Health 100 Top Hospitals® study identifies hospitals and leadership teams that provide the highest level of value to their communities, based on a national balanced scorecard measuring overall organizational performance across 11 key analytic measures including patient care, operational efficiency and financial stability.

The study shows if all hospitals in the U.S. performed at the level of this year's winners:

Ÿ 126,471 additional lives could be saved

Ÿ 108,926 additional patients could be complication-free

Ÿ $1.8 billion in inpatient costs could be saved

Ÿ The average patient stay would decrease by half a day.