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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 Omkar Baxhi, orthopedic hand
surgeon at Mid Atlantic Permanente Medical Group. To
start us off, would you please share a
little bit about yourself, your role, and your
organization? Sure. Yeah. So I'm a orthopedic hand
surgeon by training.
So that means that the vast majority of
my surgical practice is hand to, elbow and
a little bit of shoulder work.
But, I'm part of a, 13 physician and,
four to five PA,
group, in Virginia. And so we take care
of general orthopedics in the clinic.
And then I support a total of about
2,000 doctors,
through throughout the Middle Atlantic states for Kaiser
Permanente, and we have the privilege of taking
care of about 800,000,
patients in the, DMV.
What trends or shifts are you seeing right
now in the industry that you think are
the most important for industry leaders to pay
attention to? So I think the the perennial
issue has always been decreased
decreasing reimbursement.
So that is the headwind that we always
face. And then the background of that is
that we always have to,
put our patients first and make sure that
the quality of our patient care is paramount.
And so as we have lower reimbursements and
as the cost of supplies and the cost
of staffing and everything else goes up,
I think we have to look at at
new,
technologies and and new innovations to to make
that balance, work out.
As outpatient care continues to grow, how do
you see the role of orthopedic spine and
ASCs evolving within the broader health care ecosystem?
Yeah. So absolutely. It's gonna be an even
more prevalent issue, as the population changes and
and as we have fewer,
health care workforce.
So I think a big part of that
is is finding the right patients to do
the right surgery for the right, intervention in
the right venue.
So we we definitely focus a lot on
transitioning from more, traditional kinda hospital based care
to in office care. So we we use,
and even moving from ASC
to in office surgeries.
So I know this is an ASC conference,
but, I think a part a big part
of that is is seeing how much of
that we can actually move into the office,
procedure suites and then free up the ASCs
for even the the things that are moving
out of the hospital, like total knees and
total joints.
Well, many organizations are exploring new technologies, partnerships,
or care models to improve efficiency and outcomes.
Are there any innovations or initiatives you found
particularly promising?
The most recent thing that comes to mind
is we are now using Ambient AI scribes,
in my organization.
And I think that's been
super helpful.
I know that my non orthopedic colleagues actually
feel like it's a it's a complete game
changer that they really can focus on on
their patients.
In my world, you know, we have a
little bit more
templated notes or more, kinda
single issues. But even then, there's always a
little bit of a difference between one patient
or the next. And so having,
having the ability to not worry about typing
out that exact thing that I know that
my phone will will pick that up, that
I know that, you know, when I come
back to them in two months, it'll be
written down for me. It really helps me
build that connection, again in in the office.
So I think that's been huge.
And then but as we move forward, I
think AI prescreen could also help so that,
you know, we talked about kinda the right
patient, the right time, the right treatment. Part
of that is is actually before they even
come to see me. So I think, you
know, having
the
the patients to know which ones do need
to see a surgeon and which ones maybe,
if it it it may get better with
time. Orthopedics,
a lot of it does, time heals.
And so, helping us to kinda narrow that
down will help us,
figure out how to best care, best deliver
care. So Mhmm. Mhmm.
Well, financial transparency is becoming a more prominent
part of the patient experience with growing expectations
from consumers and health care stakeholders alike. From
your perspective, what does true financial transparency look
like in practice?
For leaders thinking about the business side of
care, especially in an increasingly consumer driven health
care environment,
how can financial transparency become not just a
patient win, but a competitive advantage?
Yeah. Absolutely. So I know we we focus
so much on on providers and health care
systems, but let's be honest. The the cost
of health care eventually comes down to the
patients. So that has to be a part
of our conversation. And it's not just when
they come to see us, but it's also
when they're selecting their their health plans and
their, in their
open enrollment period. So,
I'm privileged to be at at a, on
that permanent medicine. So,
we are able to,
take that part out of our clinic,
discussions,
because the patients have essentially signed on to
a health plan that
there there's always a little bit of difference.
But for for the most part, their premiums
cover their entire care, so there's not as
much of a a surprise or an out
of pocket. But so I think that that
the
shift has to be where do we talk
about financial costs. Is it just when you're
when you're in the office or when you're
just paying for your surgery? Is it when
you're signing up for your health plan? Is
it when you think about when I have
an injury and I'm losing days off of
work? I think that needs to be part
of that financial cost consideration as well. So,
you know, in my world, risk fractures are
becoming more controversial as to which ones do
we need to fix, which ones do we
not.
And that's a great technical decision that that
needs
to take place.
And it's easy to say that surgeries for
wrist fractures are more costly. And so in
a value based care,
if you if you had a very myopic
view, you would say surgery is probably not
the right cost consideration.
But then I think that that takes,
patients out of the picture. I think if
you have a very manual job and you
can't go to work for three months, it's
very different than if you have a a
computer job, and you could easily be working
and and still earning a paycheck, for those
three months where you're casted. So I think
we we definitely have to to expand our
view
of of really what cost means, and I
think that'll that'll help a lot. So I
really like that. Omkar, thank you so much
for joining us today on the show. But
before I let you go, is there anything
else you'd like to touch on or any
final thoughts you'd like to leave with us?
I think it was just, it was it's
great to be here and to learn from
everyone,
at the conference. It was really amazing to
see how we have CEOs of health plans.
We have, of course, we have doctors and
and ASC leaders.
And, I was at a a panel recently
where where we talked about how the only
way to move forward and to innovate is
to have all these people at the table,
and and we need to do that more
often, I think. So thank you for for,
organizing this. It's our pleasure. Thank you again
for joining us today. Thanks. Have a lovely
rest of your day.