At the 12th Annual Spine, Orthopedic and Pain Management-Driven ASC Conference + the Future of Spine, June 12 in Chicago, Mike Galvin, administrator of The Christ Hospital Spine Surgery Center in Cincinnati and Michael Stroup, senior vice president of acquisitions, United Surgical Partners International, discussed the prescription for a successful spine surgery center and how The Christ Hospital Spine Surgery Center has achieved great results.
The surgery center features three operating rooms, one procedure room and 9 patient rooms. It includes 16 neurosurgeons and encompasses 14,000 square feet. According to Mr. Stroup, the center, which USPI acquired in 2009, took a while to become a thriving spine surgery center. "With The Christ Hospital Spine Surgery Center, we focused on great clinical outcomes, but also on growth and clinical development," he said.
A few key aspects of the center helped bring it to the point of success, said Mr. Galvin, including:
• A strong surgeon team
• A convenient location
• Starting out with low-acuity cases and then moving on to higher acuity procedures
• Smart contracting, with a mix of out-of-network and in-network
• An anesthesia team with outpatient procedure expertise
Some of the surgery center's clinical achievements are: an infection rate that is less than 1 percent, an admission/transfer rate that is 3.4 per 1,000 and turnover times of 14 minutes. "We also focus on on-time starts and 76 percent of cases at the center start within seven minutes of the schedules start time," said Mr. Galvin.
According to Mr. Galvin, surgery centers need to constantly be looking for ways to enhance their performance. Some ways to this are:
• Motivate surgeons
• Standardize devices
• Optimize scheduling
• Constant vigilance regarding payer contracting
"Lumbar fusions is where we thing our growth is," said Mr. Galvin. "We also want to continue leveraging our spine ASC's value by continually getting better and proving good outcomes and cost-effectiveness."
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