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procedures. She did only 2 in February, but still had to pay $8,500.
If Fayette County Hospital in Vandalia, Ill., has too few cataract
patients, they reschedule the cases for next month, says Surgical
Services Manager Melissa Williams, RN, BSN, CNOR.
As a rule of thumb, Dr. Patterson says outsourcing a femto laser will
be profitable if your facility hosts at least 500 cataract cases a year
and can convert 25% of those cases (125) to the femto. That would
give you about 10 laser cases per month.
As an economic model, outsourcing eye surgery works because it
lets surgical facilities pay only slightly higher variable costs without
having to shoulder the brunt of the capital equipment outlay, says
Matt Jensen, the director of Vance Thompson Vision in Sioux Falls,
S.D. "If you're doing 10 cataract cases a month across a few surgeons,
it might be in your best interest to have someone bring in the capital
equipment and run it for you for a flat fee," says Mr. Jensen.
The quest of an outsourcing company is to develop a route of 15 or
20 surgical facilities in a given area where they can bring the phaco
machine or femtosecond laser from site to site. He notes that out-
sourcing companies are creating "new audiences" for femtosecond
lasers, giving access to a swath of surgical centers that otherwise
would not have the volume or capital to afford a laser. "They're bring-
ing their laser to surgery centers that would have never thought of
purchasing a femtosecond laser," he says.
The next big thing
Cataract outsourcing was built on helping facilities offer their surgeons
and their patients the ability to perform basic cataract procedures,
facilities like St. Luke's North Hospital in Kansas City, Mo. Not having
to train staff or manage the phaco machines, microscopes and lens
inventory is a huge relief to Debbie Nusbaum, RN, BS, MA, CNOR, the
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