This is Rosie Talaga with the Becker's Healthcare
podcast. Today, I'm thrilled to be joined by
Tina Driggers, administrator of day surgery center, to
talk about some of the biggest trends in
the ASC industry. Tina, it's a pleasure to
have you on the podcast today. Can you
please take a moment to introduce yourself and
your work in the industry?
Sure.
My name is Tina Driggers.
I've been at the Day Surgery Center in
Winter Haven, Florida for 18 years, and I've
been the administrator there since January of 2021.
We're a multispecialty
physician owned facility.
Great. Thank you so much. So our first
question regards the fact that
ASC volume across the country is expected to
increase by 16%
by 2032.
With this growth, what are the most pressing
challenges to maintaining a positive patient experience?
Our most complained about things are wait time
and money.
So educating patients on their benefits is important
and,
patient expectation of the wait time.
Obviously, we tell them to come early because
you have to check-in.
You have to have IVs started. You have
to have all those things, and they expect
there to be no wait time for that.
And then also,
explaining to them that sometimes things take longer
than we schedule them for.
So just keeping them
updated
on their wait time. That is our biggest
complaint from the patients.
And, also,
finding and maintaining the right staff
to utilize,
for those things. Mhmm. And when looking at
issues such as wait time or staffing issues,
What are some strategies that have worked for
your organization to tackle these challenges, and what's
a recommendation you have for healthcare leaders to
stay ahead?
We monitor the surgeons' OR time so that
we can adjust those. We work with their
offices to take care of that,
and our surgery schedulers.
We also had a issue with our surgeons
being tardy. So we have a tardy surgeon,
policy. So if they're late, they're punished for
that. So
that has worked out well for us for
the start time in the mornings.
Sometimes we adjust their arrival time,
sometimes 2 hours, sometimes 1 and a half,
sometimes 1, depending on the surgeon. So those
are,
things that we have done to take care
of that. Great. Thank you. Mhmm. Another challenge
that's prevalent is the payment and financial aspects.
So how can leaders ensure their staff are
well equipped to help patients navigate the financial
aspects of their care? And how does this
benefit patient to provider relationships?
Okay.
Staff education.
I know some providers like UnitedHealthcare
just want to
have,
things that you can go to for education
education for your staff.
I think it's important to discuss those things
with the offices so that they're aware,
of what we can and can't do and
how much that's gonna cost a patient. We
we make lists for our surgeons,
so they have a list of things that
we can and can't do per
insurance. Basically, we take
pretty much everything, workers' comp,
commercial, Medicare, Medicare Advantage. So we we put
them out that way. It's really helpful to
the staff
so that patients aren't upset whenever they get
scheduled somewhere
and they can't be done there. So they
put them where they belong
at the beginning. Right.
Yeah. Kind of relates to the transparency you
talked about with wait time. Mhmm. It's also
being transparent for what can be done, what
can't be done, and what those prices might
look like. Mhmm. That's great. So if there's
lastly, if there's anything else we didn't talk
about or something that's on the top of
your mind is the AIC industry that you'd
like to talk about.
I think most everybody,
has issues with anesthesia.
Mhmm. Something we all talk about all the
time.
Our anesthesia providers
or anesthesiologists
are owners at our facility, so that's advantageous
for us.
But, their staff is our staff. That's how
we treat them. If our staff gets a
gift, they also get that gift. I think
it's important to make them
part of your family so that they stay
where they're very short in supply.
So Got it. Well, thank you so much.
And thank you for joining us today, and
thank you for speaking with us at the
event. It's been a pleasure, and we look
forward to connecting with you soon. Thank you.