In less than six months, Tan Chen, MD, has joined a new team of providers; including Andy Mo, MD, and Andrew Fanous, MD; who are partnering with the Inova Spine Program to expand access and deliver more coordinated spine care across Inova Health System in Fairfax, Va.
Dr. Chen, who joined Inova in November, has worked with the established team at Alexandria, Va.-based Inova Mount Vernon Hospital into a local destination for spine surgery, and he’s bringing his expertise in minimally invasive spine surgery as a new value proposition for patients.
Dr. Chen spoke with Becker’s about his strategies and how he plans to tackle an expected influx of patient growth.
Note: This conversation was lightly edited for clarity and length.
Question: How have you grown within Inova’s spine program since joining last year?
Dr. Tan Chen: Overall it’s been going very well. We’ve seen pretty strong and exciting growth at Inova Mount Vernon Hospital. By expanding care, adding new providers, and building a unified spine care pathway over the past six months, we’ve created a seamless patient experience that demonstrates what it means to be a true spine center of excellence. We really improved our patient access, and we really turned into a pretty significant regional spine presence. We have multiple different catchment sites across Fairfax, Springfield and Woodbridge, as well as a little bit of outreach into Washington, D.C., and Maryland.
As we’re positioning this program, a lot of these patients can be seen closer to where they live and access spine care at Mount Vernon. I joined Inova about four months ago, and I think patient demand and surgical volume have significantly increased at Mount Vernon, especially with spine. It really shows that the community trusts us, and they’re becoming more and more aware of the program.
Q: What are some of the actions and practices that you’ve done to really see this shift so quickly?
TC: Part of it is the large catchment area that we cover. We have multiple different sites that I personally go to across the Northern Virginia area and Woodbridge.
We have a growing presence in those areas, and then we funnel all of those patients toward Mount Vernon Hospital. Before, Mount Vernon really had pretty much no spine presence, but now it’s become one of the highest sub-specialties by volume.
The other thing I’m most excited about is developing and expanding this minimally invasive spine program at the hospital, particularly in the outpatient setting. A lot of patients want to see a faster recovery and smaller incision. They don’t really want the overnight stay. They want less disruption to their already very busy lives and an overall lower cost too. As patients in this area start to hear more and more about the program, it’s helped us really gain a lot of traction over the last couple months.
Q: Are there any numbers to illustrate the growth of the minimally invasive spine program?
TC: Right now my wait time for surgery is about two months or so. We’ve grown surgeries at Inova Mount Vernon by 10x in the last six months, with more growth coming in thanks to my colleagues and me adding appointments to meet the needs of the community locally. There’s still lots of room to grow for further development and evolution and find the right personnel to really develop an efficient and effective program. But I think for where we are today, considering we really started only a couple months ago, I think we really kind of hit the ground running with this program.
Q: What are the biggest headwinds you’re anticipating this year, and how will you approach those?
TC: With this type of rapid growth, certainly one of the biggest challenges that I see is going to be maintaining that access and preserving the high, high patient experience quality. As the volume starts to really wrap up.
I think we really have to become more and more intentional about how we schedule these patients efficiently, how we develop a good clinic flow and block utilization. We don’t want patients to be waiting several months to get in to see us in the clinic, and then several more months to get that surgery. That’s not a good workflow, and it causes a lot of dissatisfaction. But as we get busier it’s going to be a matter of balancing high quality and quick access for the patients.
At the Becker's 23rd Annual Spine, Orthopedic and Pain Management-Driven ASC + The Future of Spine Conference, taking place June 11-13 in Chicago, spine surgeons, orthopedic leaders and ASC executives will come together to explore minimally invasive techniques, ASC growth strategies and innovations shaping the future of outpatient spine care. Apply for complimentary registration now.
