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forward slash beckerspodcast.
Hello, and welcome to the Becker's Healthcare podcast
recorded live at the twenty second annual spine,
orthopedic, and pain management driven ASC and future
of spine conference.
I'm joined today by doctor Al Abdesayid, medical
director at UW Health Pain Services.
Doctor Al, thank you so much for joining
us today. Well, thank you for having me.
Can you start us off by sharing a
little about yourself, your role in your organization?
So my name is,
Allah Abdel Said. I go by doctor Al,
and I'm the medical director of, pain services
at the University of Wisconsin, which include inpatient
pain,
outpatient pain. We have a very large academic,
chronic pain program,
training programs. So, I get the
privilege of overseeing,
the the pain practices, all across CW health
system.
So what trends or shifts are you currently
seeing right now in the industry that you
are think
are most important for industry leaders to be
paying attention to?
I don't know where to start with this
one. There is a lot to pay attention
to, but most importantly,
I think the, reimbursement challenges kinda that's comes
to my mind, like, number one, because,
without the appropriate,
reimbursement, it's hard to maintain practice, hard to
care of patients. Mhmm.
You know, I come second to my mind
is insurance denials
Mhmm. Which again, prevent patients from getting some
care they need to get. So these are
probably, two very important topics. Mhmm. Mhmm.
And staffing and workforce challenges continue to be
a concern across health care. How is your
organization navigating these pressures, and, what strategies are
you currently seeing work well? So very good
point. Definitely, there is shortage of, workforce at
all levels, not only,
like physician, but we are,
finding shortage in nurses or support staff, medical
assistants.
And the strategy is, very challenging because there
is national shortage, and, basically, systems try to
maintain their own task force. But I think
that
that creates shortage somewhere else. But I guess
at the organizational level, we need to have
good, retention policies,
good recruitment policies,
good work balance,
lifestyle,
good,
financial
incentive for work and create of a friendly,
safe work environment to maintain people and have
them grow in their careers without, the need
to leave.
So as outpatient care continues to grow, how
do you see the role of,
pain services
really kind of evolving within the broader health
care ecosystem?
Outpatient is a main focus now of health
care systems for many reasons. Number one is,
there are advancement in technology and procedures. We
don't need to keep patients in hospitals,
which is good again for many reasons. The,
it's lower cost,
better care because the patient now, less likely
to get admitted to the hospital with with
the risk of, DVTs and hospital acquired infections,
and they're being away from their family, beloved
one being in their bed at home. So
definitely the expansion on the ambulatory side is
a key. It's growing fast. We'll continue to
grow fast as we advance as a technology,
and it's something we need to allocate more
resources for. Mhmm.
And so many organizations are exploring new technologies,
partnerships, or care models to improve efficiency and
outcomes.
Are there any innovations or initiatives that you
found to be particularly promising?
There there are many. A lot of it
is about preoperative patient care that allow patients
to be prepared for the surgery, like, get
their surgery quickly, go discharged home, by use
of a new long acting local anesthetics,
good like, pain management,
that starts even planning, before surgery,
advancement of minimally invasive procedures and,
which come with robotic surgeries and many other
kinds of, minimally invasive surgeries that there are
no big incisions,
work done nicely and clean. And this way,
the patient have less pain,
less incisions to care for, and potentially, like,
quick discharge and back to activity and productivity.
So in your view, how does strengthening financial
communication help foster long term trust and loyalty
between patients and providers?
That's a very, very good question. Because when
we talk about financial strength, it's not only
about
good reimbursement
or
expensive service or patients paying. Because it's multifaceted,
concept
in that if I can get the patient
to do the procedure and go home at
the same day, they'll be more productive in
the community. They'll be back to work within
one or two days.
And and this is financially important for the
patient, for the community, for for the whole
country,
rather than,
maybe go the other way, do it the
traditional way. Maybe,
yeah, maybe insurance will pay less, but then
you have to admit the patient, lose work,
maybe develop complications, may spend more money on
this. So we have to look at it
at all aspects, not at only the onetime
reimbursement,
or payment that go through or between the
patient and the facility, but rather on the
whole spectrum of care and how much,
this maybe onetime service would be a lot
more cost effective.
Right. Right.
Well, doctor Al, I wanna thank you so
much for joining us on the show today.
But before I let you go, is there
anything you'd like to leave with the audience
or any final thoughts?
I,
I would like to share with people that,
it's my first time at the Bakers conference,
and I'll be coming every year. Great place
Great,
place to connect and learn from others. I
encourage everybody to visit next year. Mhmm. And
I encourage everyone to, not only to visit
for the sake of learning, but also sharing
experiences,
you know, hanging out together to learn from
each other and hopefully face all the challenges
in the health care system that we encounter
now, we continue to encounter in the future.
Awesome. Well, thank you again for joining us,
doctor Al, and I hope you have a
lovely rest of your day. Thanks so much.
My pleasure.