Imagine this. You're at the Hyatt Regency Chicago
surrounded by the top minds in the ambulatory
surgery center industry.
Welcome to the Becker's 30th annual meeting, the
business and operations of ASCs from October 30th
to November 2nd
2024. Picture the excitement as you collect business
cards from over a 1000 executive level attendees
forging priceless connections.
Feel the buzz of conversations as you participate
in more than 60 sessions led by over
225 elite ASC speakers.
Envision yourself gaining actionable insights on topics like
private equity strategies,
ASC business growth, and innovations in spine, orthopedics,
GI, ophthalmology, and cardiology.
Now imagine yourself listening to inspiring keynotes from
Hall of Fame boxing world champion, Lila Ali,
and professional basketball player, Caitlin Clark. Their stories
will motivate you to take your business to
new heights. You'll leave with a wealth of
knowledge and a network of connections to help
lead your ASC into the next year. Don't
miss out. Get registered today. Visit beckershospitalreviewdot
com and click on the events page to
find the conference website. That's the beckershospitalreview.com
events page. See you in Chicago.
Hello, and welcome to the Becker's Healthcare Podcast.
My name is Chanel Bonger. And right now,
I have the pleasure of speaking with Margaret
Chappell, the CEO of Center For Advanced Surgery,
who joins us today to share insights into
her background,
ASC trends she's keeping an eye on, and
a bit more. Margaret, thank you so much
for joining me today. Could you please take
a moment to introduce yourself and tell us
a bit about your background and the Center
For Advanced Surgery? Absolutely. As you know, my
name is Margaret Chapel, and I am an
RN with a master's
degree in science, specializing in biology
and also an MBA,
specializing in health care administration.
So I've been in the business. I'm dating
myself here, but
for 44
years,
and,
mainly in the outpatient
business for
the last 40, I would say.
I'm currently
the administrator,
CEO of Center For Advanced Surgery in right
outside of Charleston,
South Carolina
and have had major jobs with the SCOA
and HCA Healthcare
in the past,
and it's really nice,
this job, because I'm sleeping in my bed
every night
and not traveling.
Love to hear it. And to get us
started, could could you please tell us about
the trends that you're watching in either the
ASC space or just health care overall?
I believe that our biggest
challenge right now is in reimbursement.
Obviously,
prices for everything,
every single supply and labor
benefits,
everything is increasing,
and our reimbursements
are not necessarily
increasing
in the same manner
that the price is for everything. So I
think we're all economically
challenged
in the ASC
space. Although we have made great strides
with reimbursement,
it's still a challenge. So that's
probably
the thing that I have my eye on
at the moment.
Absolutely.
Now moving forward, I kinda have a 2
part question for you.
In your role, what are you most focused
on and excited about?
And, also, what initiative or project from the
last 6 to 18 months are you the
most proud of?
Well, the last 6 to 18 months, we
have been able to
keep our staffing costs
at least flat and not go up by,
instituting
some efficiencies
of scale
with we do a lot of ophthalmology
in the center. So
we've learned to work
smarter
and not harder
by trying to get most of the physicians
using the same supplies,
the same preference cards,
and,
you know, trying to keep those costs down,
which makes it more efficient in staffing
because we're also not
trying to teach
a new staff member
a new way to do something
every month when a new procedure comes across.
So
that is
something that I'm proud of. I also
it's been difficult to retain staff,
but we have less than a 10% turnover
right now, which is fabulous.
And we are between 45
and 50 employees at any given moment. We
do between
6,7,000
cases
annually,
and
it you know, we work hard.
So
to keep,
you know, the supplies to a minimum
and get the each physician
on board
to utilize
common supplies has really been difficult, but
we've done it.
Yeah. Definitely.
Now with your 44 years of experience in
health care, you're the perfect person to ask
this question.
With that, what advice would you give to
an evolving leader that wants to lead the
same type of career that you've led so
far?
The first thing I would say is you've
got to be flexible because everything could change
in a minute as we all experienced with
COVID.
We were performing cases in our surgery center
on March
17th
2020. And on March 18th, we were closed
for 8 weeks. So
it was such a challenge to be flexible
to maintain the staff that we absolutely
had to maintain
and to be able to
know that we would reopen
and what that was gonna look like.
So I haven't taken any of that for
granted.
I know that that could happen again.
And, you know, it's more more than likely
something of that magnitude will happen again. I've
been in surgery centers with fires and,
you know, all kinds of natural
disasters,
and I can
advise
any new leader. You've got to be flexible.
The second thing is you have got to
know
all your options
before you present those to your physician owners
or your board
or your hospital
overlap
or whomever you report to. Make sure you've
done your research.
There's nothing worse than going into a meeting
and knowing
the right thing to do, but not having
done the background check
or the background
research
to make sure that you know all the
options and present
why the option you choose
is the best.
So those are my my two things. Always
have the meeting before the meeting.
Absolutely.
So remain flexible
and get your ducks in a row before
presenting to your team.
I truly appreciate that advice, and I truly
appreciate you for joining me today on the
Pickers Self Care podcast. It's been a pleasure.
Thank you so much, Margaret.
Thank you for
having me.