Hospital Corporation of America (NYSE: HCA), a leading healthcare
provider with 166 hospitals and 113 ambulatory surgery centers in 20
states and the United Kingdom, has been named a World’s Most Ethical
Company® by the Ethisphere Institute for the sixth
consecutive year.
Ethisphere is the global leader in defining and advancing the standards
of ethical business practices. The World’s Most Ethical Companies
designation recognizes those organizations that have had a material
impact on the way business is conducted by fostering a culture of ethics
and transparency at every level of the company. There are 132
organizations on Ethisphere’s 2015 World’s Most Ethical Companies. HCA
is one of only three healthcare services organizations honored this year.
“Being named one of Ethisphere’s World’s Most Ethical Companies is in
large part a reflection of our innovative Ethics and Compliance Program,
which serves as a model for others in the healthcare services sector,”
said Alan Yuspeh, HCA’s senior vice president and chief ethics and
compliance officer. “Of particular note are our Internal Compliance
Reporting process, our Compliance Process Review efforts and our
Responsible Executive program.”
As part of HCA’s focus on ethics and compliance, the company has named
42 individuals to serve as Responsible Executives for 46 areas of
compliance risk; these individuals provide leadership in developing
policies and procedures and training and communication, monitoring
implementation and providing guidance in their areas of risk. The
Internal Compliance Reporting process requires disclosure to the Ethics
and Compliance Department of a wide range of potential regulatory
violations, which are investigated and addressed as necessary.
Compliance Process Reviews are conducted in each hospital every three to
four years with the intent of assessing the facility’s effectiveness in
implementing the Company’s Ethics and Compliance Program and providing
assistance in improving the facility’s efforts, if necessary. This
review program fosters the sharing of best practices among all our
facilities.
In addition, HCA is a leader in environmental practices among healthcare
companies. Increasingly, the company is purchasing eco-friendly
products, using sustainable building materials, enhancing recycling
efforts and using energy and water more efficiently. HCA has installed
both solar and geothermal energy sources at facilities and helped lead
an industry effort to create standardized environmental questions for
healthcare purchases. HCA is a member of Practice GreenHealth and a
charter member of the Healthier Hospitals Initiative, two organizations
that champion eco-friendly practices in healthcare.
HCA also is active philanthropically, supporting agencies that promote
health and well-being, support childhood and youth development and
foster the arts in Middle Tennessee. The HCA Foundation has awarded
grants totaling approximately $25 million since 2008.
“The World’s Most Ethical Companies embrace the correlation between
ethical business practice and improved company performance. These
companies use ethics as a means to further define their industry
leadership and understand that creating an ethical culture and earning
the World’s Most Ethical Companies recognition involves more than just
an outward facing message or a handful of senior executives saying the
right thing,” said Ethisphere’s chief executive officer, Timothy
Erblich. “Earning this recognition involves the collective action of a
global workforce from the top down. We congratulate everyone at HCA for
this extraordinary achievement.”
The World's Most Ethical Company assessment is based upon the Ethisphere
Institute’s Ethics
Quotient™ (EQ) framework developed over years of research to provide
a means to assess an organization’s performance in an objective,
consistent and standardized way. Scores are generated in five key
categories: ethics and compliance program (35%), corporate citizenship
and responsibility (20%), culture of ethics (20%), governance (15%) and
leadership, innovation and reputation (10%). The full list of the 2015
World's Most Ethical Companies can be found at http://ethisphere.com/worlds-most-ethical/wme-honorees/.
All references to “Company” and “HCA” as used throughout this release
refer to HCA Holdings, Inc. and its affiliates.
HCA Holdings, Inc.
Investor Contact:
Mark Kimbrough, 615-344-2688
or
Media Contact:
Ed Fishbough, 615-344-2810