AUGUSTA — The VA Maine Healthcare System recently announced that it received a four-star overall quality and a five-star patient experience rating from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). This is the first time CMS has included VA facilities in its annual Overall Hospital Quality Star Ratings.

The CMS uses five categories — mortality, safety of care, readmission, patient experience, and timely and effective care — to award a quality rating for each hospital. The more stars (out of five), the better a hospital performed on the available quality measures.

Overall, 67% of VA hospitals included in the CMS annual ratings received either 4 or 5 stars, compared to only 41% of non-VA hospitals.

These findings are the latest in a series of recent evaluations showing the effectiveness of VA health care compared to non-VA health care. VA hospitals outperformed non-VA hospitals on all 10 core patient satisfaction metrics in the recent Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems Star Ratings, and a recent systematic review of more than 40 peer-reviewed studies found that VA health care is consistently as good as — or better than — non-VA health care.

“I am incredibly proud of the VA Maine team! Our inpatient acute care received an overall four-star quality rating and five-star patient experience rating,” said VA Maine Healthcare System’s medical center director, Tracye B. Davis, according to a news release. “VA Maine’s culture of continuous improvement supports our mission to provide exceptional health care for Body, Mind, and Spirit.”

“Our job at VA is to deliver the best possible care to every veteran who walks through our doors,” said VA Under Secretary for Health Dr. Shereef Elnahal. “While we’re very proud of these findings, there is still work to do. We will study these results, learn from them, and continue to improve until we’re delivering world-class care to every veteran, every time.”

For more information, visit www.va.gov/maine-health-care.