Six ASC leaders joined Becker's to discuss the biggest growth opportunities for surgery centers.
Editor's note: Responses have been lightly edited for clarity and length.
Toni Barnas. Associate Consultant at Consultants in Healthcare (Little Rock, Ark.): The biggest opportunities for growth are the addition of higher acuity cases to the Medicare fee schedule and the consumer base/patients becoming more well versed with their healthcare options by looking for lower-cost, high-quality services.
Tasha Cieslak. CEO of Louisiana Gastroenterology Associates (Lafayette): So much technology is coming out now and on the horizon. I went to Digestive Disease Week this year and loved seeing new things such as artificial intelligence, disposable PillCam, etc. The more you stay up to date with the latest and greatest, the greater patient care we are delivering. Screening has been established for several years now. It's still the gold standard but as we are living longer, more disease states need to be treated. I love the ability to offer more therapeutic services in an ambulatory setting.
Deann Davis. Administrator of Surgical Care Center (Painesville, Ohio): I think ASCs' biggest opportunity for growth is expanding the services that are being offered. Many specialties are leaning toward performing procedures in an ASC for many reasons. One of the biggest reasons is patient preference. I feel patients get more one-on-one attention in an ASC, they get to know their nurses and anesthesiologist on a more personable level and that promotes a positive impact on patients, especially in the elderly population. Sometimes they just need to know someone is listening to them and is willing to help them understand their procedure that they are going to have done. Also, wait times tend to be less in an ASC, which patients are looking for because they can return to their daily lives much quicker.
Kelly Fowler. Administrator of Surgical Institute of Alabama (Vestavia Hills): The biggest opportunity is the continued shift of higher-acuity cases to our ASCs. Many procedures traditionally performed in a hospital as outpatient are finally able to be performed in surgery centers and this is exciting for growth and physician recruitment.
Josh Mastracci. Director of an Investment Bank TM Capital's Healthcare Practice (Atlanta): The growing quality and optionality of specialty services supporting physicians on the operations side of outpatient facilities - both by health systems via joint ventures and by private ventures focused on improvements to specific functionality like revenue cycle, recruiting, volume/case mix analysis, site selection/construction management, certification/licensure, etc. - is creating an increased opportunity for physician owners to scale these facilities as businesses while not sacrificing, and in fact making material improvements to, access to and quality of care for patients.
Raghu Reddy. Chief Administrative Officer at SurgCenter of Western Maryland (Cumberland): With evolving technology in healthcare, there will be more opportunities to streamline ASC operations and retool effectively, which can result in substantial savings. Technological, instrumentation and clinical advances will disrupt healthcare in the coming years and pave the way for more case migration to ASCs. Payers are already well aware of the future of healthcare in our country, but their reimbursement strategy does not align with the changing dynamics in the ASC arena. Specialties such as cardiology, bariatric surgery, colorectal surgery, and many high-acuity cases from other specialties show the most significant growth opportunities for ASCs. Certificate-of-need is still a barrier to healthcare cost savings, and as the healthcare market evolves, most states will create the path for ASCs, as we see in some states. Robotic surgery is promising, but who is paying for it ultimately is the million-dollar