Another changing aspect of healthcare is how patient want their care delivered. Read how these leaders are evolving their patient care.
The nine leaders featured in this article are all speaking at Becker's 21st Annual Spine, Orthopedic and Pain Management-Driven ASC + The Future of Spine Conference which is set for June 19-22 at the Swissotel in Chicago.
If you would like to join either event as a speaker, contact Randi Haseman at rhaseman@beckershealthcare.com.
As part of an ongoing series, Becker's is talking to healthcare leaders who will speak at our roundtable. The following are answers from our speakers at the event.
Question: How is your approach to patient care evolving?
Gregory Howard, MD. Director at MHP Lifestyle Medicine & Bone Health Clinic: With research opening our eyes to the most fundamental causes of disease, including orthopedic problems stemming from chronic inflammation, sedentary lifestyles, calorie-dense and nutrient-deficient foods, and poor sleep and recovery, the focus of my practice has shifted to engaging and educating my patients with changing their lifestyle and preventing future injuries and health declines.
I’ve built into my schedule longer new patient visits, tailored follow up visits toward goal-engagement and concrete action plans to implement before follow up visits.
Like it or not, patients are seeking advice from social media and friend-groups because they are losing faith and trust in the medical system even as they sprint toward us when their health begins to decline. I have been embracing breaking away from the calcified 20th century approaches to healthcare and I’m focusing on time and expertise in sports medicine, bone health and lifestyle medicine as part of my value proposition to our health system and my patients.
Because patients want to be more involved in medical decision making, I am spending that time educating patients on the real-world effects of their lifestyles. I am leaning into advanced biometric testing for assessing current physiologic status, future health risk analysis and am on the cusp of diving into AI health plan generation tailored to the individual.
Patients are looking to increase their longevity and health span. I believe we need to be the experts in the room providing them with researched, wellness-driven plans which improve the chance that they might live a longer, more connected and fulfilling life. And patients are loving this approach.
Thomas C. Schuler, MD, FACS. Spine surgeon and founder at Virginia Spine Institute as well as chairman at National Spine Health Foundation: The treatment of patients' spinal conditions are greatly improving because of the technologies and knowledge that we now have. Artificial discs and regenerative medicine have added vast improvement to our patient outcomes and options. Motion preservation and restoration is the new optimal option. Artificial discs in the neck and low back allow better function and greatly reduced stress transfer to adjacent levels. Greatly expanded indications including 3-5 level arthroplasties and hybrid cases are the norm today. This results in better short-term and long-term results for our patients. The ultimate motion preservation is no surgery with regenerative injections to seal injured discs and/or other spinal structures. Bone marrow concentrate aspirated from the patient's iliac crest is greatly reducing the number of people needing a surgical solution to their chronic back pain, while preserving natural function/motion. The payer world needs to catch up with the intellectual and technical evolution.
Russ Bodner, MD. Orthopedic surgeon at Northwestern Medicine: For the past several years, I have studied patients with functional standing and sitting X-rays of the hip-spine-femoral complex allowing me to answer why people are having troubles biomechanically. Doctors only study anatomy looking for what is the matter but the why has made a great difference and patients find great relief that their doctor understands the troubles they experience in daily activities. I understand both the hip and spine issues that are so interconnected now and very specialists do.
Sterling Elliott, PharmD. Assistant professor for orthopaedic surgery and clinical pharmacist lead at Northwestern Medicine: I'm looking at ways to optimize value with the prospect that value-based care is the emerging direction in the American healthcare landscape. Revenues are critical to the financial wellbeing of the business model, and when change steamrolls through, adaptation will reign supreme. Change is scary and uncomfortable, but finding ways to capitalize can have widespread benefit. In the end, finding innovative approaches to patient care services sets us up to provide high quality patient care and safeguard the stability of our economic landscape.
Zeeshan Tayeb, MD. Owner and medical director at Pain Specialists of Cincinnati: Pain is complex and so is the treatment of pain. That's why the constant evolving of our specialty requires more than just a few tools in our toolbelt. Evolving the multidisciplinary standard of pain treatment is more important than ever. When we look at a multidisciplinary approach, we must think about the complexity in which our patients present, such as comorbidities, socio-economic factors and past trauma often associated with injury. One big evolution is to maintain contact with our patients outside of the time they are in the office. Offering chronic care management to patients with a diverse group of support staff can improve outcomes and evolve the patient experience.
Yesh Navalgund, MD. CMO at National Spine & Pain Centers: My approach to patient care is evolving towards more personalized treatment options. With the explosion in AI-assisted software, I am able to offer patients a greater degree of fine tuning as it pertains to the type of care they receive. This is particularly evident in the neuromodulation space where devices are able to use feedback technology to assist in modifying treatments in real time. I also see a future in which the ability to digest large amounts of historical data will allow physicians to view missed treatments in a given algorithm.
Shehzad Choudry, MD. Director for interventional spine and pain at Orlando Health Interventional Spine Pain Department: I feel aspects of patient care are becoming more automated. This makes everyone practice at the top of their license and feels a responsibility for patient improvement. The whole care team including nurses, MAs physical therapists, APPs, rehab physicians, interventional spine docs and surgeons have constant communication with the patient and each other. We are always tweaking aspects of the patient journey to improve patient outcomes as well as patient experience. We continue to apply the principles that we learn on our patient population. Several years ago we just needed to have good outcomes, now we are producing great outcomes and amazing patient experiences.
Brian Curtin, MD. Orthopedic surgeon at OrthoCarolina Hip and Knee Center: Patient care continues to evolve becoming further patient-centric as patients want to be seen when convenient for their busy lives and an unwillingness to wait more than a few days to be seen. Our urgent care network has become busier than ever predicted and physician schedules are being stretched to accommodate both earlier and later appointments in the day. I also spend a lot more time micromanaging my surgery schedule and finding additional OR time if I get booked out too far as patients just don't want to wait months for surgery sometimes and will seek out second opinion very quickly if it allows for better fit with their schedule and needs.
James W. Larson, III, MD. Orthopedic surgeon at Bone and Joint Specialists of Winchester: My approach to patient care is evolving to be focused on combining convenience and best practice. Not only are we improving our infection rates and outcomes via improved preoperative screening and clearance, we are reducing the number of visits the patient has to make to healthcare facilities to get these done. This has led us to improved outcomes, better patient experiences and decreased infection rates while also reducing the number of trips the patient has to make, decreasing wait time for surgery and the vast majority of our patients getting home the same day as their joint replacement.