St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma has won a 2004/2005 Consumer Choice Award, marking the sixth-consecutive year it has received the honor.

National Research Corp. (NRC), a leading healthcare performance-measurement company, manages the nationwide award program, which selected 186 hospitals and healthcare organizations across the nation for the honor. The results were announced in the Sept. 20 edition of the national magazine, Modern Healthcare.  

St. Joseph is one of only 186 hospitals and healthcare organizations to win the award this year. The NRC survey is the largest of its kind, and is conducted annually to compile consumers’ assessments of their health plans, physicians, local hospitals and health systems. The survey asked consumers to name their preferred hospitals, identify which organizations have the best doctors, nurses, reputation, and overall community health programs. NRC mailed questionnaires to 240,000 U.S. households in April and received more than 140,000 responses. 

In addition to winning the 2004/2005 Consumer Choice Award, St. Joseph Medical Center has been named one of the Top 100 hospitals in the U.S. seven times since 1994 by Solucient, an independent healthcare ratings firm that evaluates clinical-quality data and other information from hospitals across the U.S.