The facade of UP Health System-Bell in Ishpeming is shown. The hospital has been named one of the Top 100 Critical Access Hospitals in the United States by The Chartis Center for Rural Health. (Photo courtesy of UP Health System-Bell)

MARQUETTE — UP Health System-Bell in Ishpeming on Tuesday announced it has been named one of the Top 100 Critical Access Hospitals in the United States by The Chartis Center for Rural Health.

Regarded as one of the industry’s most significant designations of performance excellence, the annual Top 100 Critical Access Hospitals award is based upon the results of the Hospital Strength Index from iVantage Health Analytics, according to a press release from the hospital.

“We are very pleased to be honored as one of the top rural hospitals in the country,” Mitch Leckelt, CEO of UPHS-Bell, said in the release. “I would like to thank all of our employees, volunteers and medical staff who have made this possible through their hard work and dedication. It’s because of their tireless commitment to our patients and our community that we were able to be recognized as a premier critical access hospital.”

Hospitals recognized scored in the top 100 among all critical access hospitals nationally. Now in its ninth year, the Hospital Strength Index leverages 50 rural-relevant indicators across eight pillars of hospital strength — such as inpatient market share, outpatient market share, cost, charge, quality, outcomes, patient perspective and financial stability — to determine an overall score for each hospital. Each of the index’s 50 indicators is culled from publicly-available data sources.

“Our team of experts at Bell do an exceptional job delivering quality, safe and compassionate care,” said Brian Sinotte, market president for UPHS. “Publicly reported quality and patient satisfaction data continues to showcase Bell as exceeding state and national benchmarks. This designation assures our communities in western Marquette County that they are receiving excellent care.”

UPHS-Marquette and UPHS-Portage do not quality for this designation as they are not critical access hospitals.

To view the list and methodology used to create it, visit www.ivantageindex.com /top-performing-hospitals.