This is Rosie Talaga with the Becker's Healthcare
Podcast. Today, I'm thrilled to be joined by
Kyle Anderson, VP of Finance and ASC at
Ortho Rhode Island,
to talk a little bit about the biggest
trends in the ASC industry. Kyle, 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?
Absolutely. Thank you. I appreciate you having me.
These are always fun podcasts to do, and
I enjoy the content that, that Becker's HealthCare
puts out. So, always happy to participate in
one. Thank you. My name is Kyle Anderson.
I'm vice president of Ortho Rhode Island and
Ortho Rhode Island Surgery Center.
Ortho Rhode Island is located in Warwick, Rhode
Island.
We are a surgery center of, 8 ORs,
and 2 procedure rooms. We perform the entire
gamut of adult orthopedic care.
We do roughly
10,000
surgery or procedures
a year in the center,
and continue to grow and focus on
things like
patient experience and additional service lines and access
and all the things that, that we're excited
about and and, most of the industry is
talking about these days. Great. Thank you so
much. So for our first question,
there is a recent statistic that
ASC volume
across the country is expected to increase by
16%
by 2032.
With this growth, what are the most pressing
challenges to men to maintaining a positive patient
experience?
Yeah. So it's it's an exciting time to
be part of the the ASC industry. Right?
It's, it's great for patients to be able
to experience care in an ASC setting. It's
great for providers to be able to provide
care in ASC setting,
and all of the sort of multitude of
staff who gets to participate in in what
is the ASC environment, I think is very
positive,
for health care.
Anytime that segment of health care or any
business experiences
rapid growth, things need to change as as
that, growth occurs. And,
in the ASC environment,
one of the things that
most directly impacts the patient experience
is that of staff engagement. Right? The staff
members are really the ones who,
are going to drive the patient experience, who
have the greatest ability to influence the patient
experience,
and that's that's what leads to patients, you
know, coming back and and being the ones
that sort of frequent your practice and,
and what establishes you reputationally within the community.
And so the challenge
in trying to maintain that,
is having the right people in the center.
Right? And and it's the right people who
are involved in the care,
and,
making sure that they are passionate about their
care that they're delivering.
The Ortho Horizon Surgery Center, we are very,
very lucky that we have phenomenal staff.
We have very engaged staff and people who,
understand and and are intrinsically
motivated to provide the best patient experience,
and that's really throughout the entire journey. Right?
If you were going to be able to
accommodate,
such significant growth, it has to start before
the patient comes to the surgery center. Right?
The patient engagement, the patient optimization.
And then once they arrive, are they being
are you being efficient with their care and
they can navigate through the surgery center and
what will ultimately lead to not only a
positive clinical outcome, but also a positive patient
experience.
Got it. So you talked about how things
need to change when there's so much growth,
staff engagement, maintaining that. So what are some
strategies that have worked for your organization to
tackle some of these challenges,
and what's a recommendation that you have for
health care leaders to stay ahead?
Yeah. So so from a from a sort
of a staff engagement standpoint, using that as
the thing to drive experience,
engaging the staff and the entire clinical care
team for that that matter early and often.
They're gonna be the ones delivering the care.
They're the ones who have the direct,
clinical experience,
and can often guide the way that an
organization moves and navigates their evolution.
I think most of the centers, would hope
and will continue to to grow in the
patient volume that they see, in the type
of specialty that they see at the center.
And so,
introducing the entire care team as part of
the approach for that growth strategy,
nursing,
anesthesia,
surgeon,
administrative staff that supports the entire process.
I think that that's really the key and
the fundamental,
element that will, produce success. Otherwise, you get
to the end point where you may have
arrived earlier than everyone else. And so, I
I think that the outcome there is not
quite as favorable as if if the entire
team tracks together in order to,
while putting the patient first, deliver care in
a way that,
is in line with, the goals and the
trajectory of the organization.
Got it. Thank you.
And then how can leaders can ensure their
staff are well equipped to help patients navigate
the financial aspects of their care and how
does this benefit the patient to provider relationship?
Yeah. The the the financial component of health
care is a challenging one, and and part
of the reason it's so challenging is because
of how confusing it is.
You know, even those who have been in
the industry for some time,
if if they have to explain to a
patient
what their obligation is and why their obligation
is that and why it may change over
time,
relative to perhaps other health care services that
they use in between that time and the
surgery,
it's just hard. And so you couple that
with,
people who,
you know, need surgery, in my my case,
orthopedic surgery are already in pain. And so
it you you introduce this financial component with
the the medical component, it becomes confusing. So,
I know that some centers will offer, payment
plans or other ways for people to expedite
access to their care, but one of the
things that we focus on, most specifically is
relative to communicating what that financial obligation might
may be. Right? Because nobody likes to go
to a doctor and then all of a
sudden you're surprised at at what that looks
like. Oftentimes, also because you're receiving that bill
and you already feel better. Mhmm. And so
it feels fair. It feels right to be
able to say, this is what this is
gonna look like,
and it allows the patient to be able
to prepare for that in their life much
like they would prepare for their surgical journey.
There's the financial element as well. And it
and it feels
like a strong foundation from which trust can
be built. Absolutely.
Lastly, is there anything else that you'd like
to add or that is on the top
of your mind recently?
No. I would just I guess I would
just say that, you know, here as we
sit and we record this at the,
at the Becker's
conference,
it's these types of events that are, energizing,
you know, energizing to many people in the
industry, and, you know, thank you to to
Becker's Healthcare for putting this on because,
this is where where innovation and ideas are
born. Right? It's the collaboration
between physicians and administrators and vendor partners,
to be able to put everything that they
have together,
because it ultimately will benefit,
the patient who's at the end of that
journey. You know? And and we wanna all
be there for when they need us the
most, and these types of events help to,
catalyze that. So I'm appreciative of everything that's
gone into today. That's great. We appreciate you
too. Thank you so much for speaking with
us, and thank you for sharing your insights
again here with me today. It's been a
pleasure, and we look forward to connecting with
you soon. Thanks for having me.