Theodore J. Choma, MD, is chief of the spine division and vice-chairman of the department of orthopedic surgery at University of Missouri School of Medicine in Columbia. He also serves as an associate professor in the department of orthopedic surgery at the University of Missouri-Columbia. He has previously served in the military and as chief of the spine surgery service at Eisenhower Army Medical Center in Augusta, Ga.
Dr. Choma is board-certified, and his research interests include cervical spine stabilization, lumbar disc disease, myelodysplastic syndromes, scoliosis, spinal cord injuries, spina bifida, spinal deformities, spine tumors and spinal degenerative diseases. He has an active interest in research and is currently focusing on the analysis of pedicle screw performance in osteoporotic bone. During his career, he has received numerous awards, and in 2013, he was a co-recipient of the Louis A. Goldstein Award from the Scoliosis Research Society. His work has been published in a wide array of professional journals such as Spine Deformity and The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery.
"2014 may be a pivotal year for spine surgeons to crystallize how we represent value for patients," says Dr. Choma. "In the past, it was sufficient for us to measure our value in the hugs or thanks we received from our patients, or their families, for the impact we made in their lives. In 2014, it is increasingly apparent that we will have to better quantify that effect on their quality of life. Thankfully, we have colleagues who have made major contributions in developing the tools to measure this. I think it will become incumbent on most of us to develop systems in which we closely follow the outcomes in our patients, document and report that so that we, as a society, can appropriately weigh this impact in balance with the costs of such care."
Dr. Choma earned his medical degree at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk and completed his residency at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. He has also completed a fellowship at Twin Cities Spine Center in Minneapolis.
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