Outpatient Surgery Magazine, providing current information on Surgical Services, Surgical Facility Administration, Outpatient Surgery News and Trends, OR Excellence and more.
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1 0 0 O U T P AT I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E O N L I N E | J U N E 2 0 1 4 offices to provide documentation that patients had physical therapy and tried anti-inflammatories before having surgery. "Now we have a pre-team get evidence of all conservative manage- ment and upload it to the billing company to submit with the claim," she says. "It speeds up payment and increases our revenue." On the plus side of the ledger, reimbursements for spine patients are generally good, in part because the spine population includes both younger and more commercially insured patients. Patients are better educated, now, too, and more willing to pay their portions of the bill upfront, says Ms. Reiter. "We collect a lot of out-of- pocket costs on the way into surgery," she says. "We used to have to talk patients into it, but now they seem to know they have to pay their share." The possibilities Despite the challenges, the opportunities are real. The list of spine procedures routinely being done on an outpatient basis is growing quickly and includes numerous surgeries that were almost solely con- fined to inpatient facilities a few years ago. The rundown includes microdiscectomy, percutaneous kyphoplasty for compression frac- tures, MIS one- and two-level lumbar decompression, minimally inva- sive cervical foraminotomy and minimally invasive lumbar lateral interbody fusion. "As we push the envelope more," says Mr. Mahanti, "our surgeons think they can start doing anterior cervical fusions and uncomplicated artificial discs, as long as they're single-level. Further down the road, they think we'll be able to do more and more lateral minimally invasive lumbar fusions." Instruments and implants have evolved dramatically in recent years, making the outpatient environment that much more attractive and S P I N E S U R G E R Y OSE_1406_part2_Layout 1 6/13/14 11:41 AM Page 100