Orthopedic surgery is often cited as one of the fields most primed for growth in the outpatient setting. However, some procedures, including total joint replacements, are still new territory for many ASCs.
John Woodward Jr., MD, chair of the orthopedic surgery section at Swedish Medical Center in Englewood, Colo., and Eric Grossman, MD, orthopedic surgeon at Philadelphia-based Rothman Orthopaedic Institute in New York City, told "Becker's ASC Review Podcast" that buy-in all around is crucial for surgery centers with new TJR programs.
Note: This is an edited excerpt. Listen to the full podcast episode here.
Question: What do you recommend for surgery centers that are considering implementing a total joints program?
Dr. John Woodward: You really need to have buy-in from three different entities. Number one, the physicians. You need to have a group of physicians that are interested, able and willing to perform total joint surgeries. They need to have the technical ability to do them and have the experience of doing them in an outpatient setting.
In addition, you have to have buy-in from the facility. Specifically, the administration needs to have the time, energy and finances to support the endeavor, because there is a capital expense when we talk about adding a joint replacement program to an outpatient surgery center, as opposed to adding ankle arthroscopy onto the arthroscopy service line at a surgery center.
Finally, you have to have buy-in from the staff, and that's a big one because you not only need the preoperative staff and the intraoperative staff but also the postoperative staff to manage a joint replacement throughout their track at your facility.
Dr. Eric Grossman: Buy-in was the first term that came to my mind as well. It does not work without significant buy-in. Taking it more granularly and fleshing out some of the terms Dr. Woodward was using: nursing, anesthesia, surgeon. Those are the three pillars I see that are so critical.