In ASCs We Trust!

August is National ASC Month, a month when employees, owners and advocates of ambulatory surgery centers celebrate and increase awareness of the many benefits outpatient surgery provides millions of patients each year.

The month is primarily designed to educate key policy and decision makers about what ASCs bring to the table – quality and affordable care that, compared to hospital outpatient experiences, is more convenient and personalized and allows patients to recuperate at home where they’re comfortable, have family support and are less likely to experience postoperative infections.

Each year, Ambulatory Surgery Center Association members open their doors and host facility tours for state, federal and local elected officials and their staff. They also send letters of support for proposed laws that would strengthen the ability of ASCs to serve more patients and engage in promotional social media campaigns.

You won’t find a bigger advocate and cheerleader for ambulatory surgery centers than Shakeel Ahmed, MD, founder of Atlas Surgical Group, one of the largest ASC franchises in the Midwest. He has authored multiple books, including “Success in Ambulatory Surgery Centers. The Next Gold Rush.”

Physician owners are not the only ones who stand to better their financial positions as ASCs expand, however. Medicare costs would be cut by billions each year if only half of orthopedic surgeries were moved from hospitals to ASCs, he says. Patients would save, too, in the form of lower co-pays and premium costs.

“August is ASC Month, which is a perfect time to get the word out that ASCs are the need of our time,” says Dr. Ahmed. “We’re drowning in debt. By definition, ASCs are the antidote to the venom in the system that perpetuates higher costs for surgeries in hospitals.”

Dr. Ahmed suggests that leaders of ASCs host events and attend community meetings to explain that outpatient surgery is safe and having procedures performed at independently-owned facilities saves patients money and puts less stress on Medicare, which is already strapped. ASC supporters could help by writing letters to their local media outlets, he says.

“Change will occur once people understand that ASCs are one of the solutions to cutting our national healthcare expenditure,” he says. “The easiest way out of this maze that has layers and layers of complexity is to simply reduce the amount of facility fees for outpatient surgeries that take place in hospital settings.”

Perhaps the most important areas that need to change to open the floodgates for independent ASCs are changes in state laws that govern the issuance of certificates of need (CON) and noncompete agreements that can limit where physicians practice. Lobbying state governments to severely curtail or abolish these laws is important, he says.

CON laws are regulatory tools that states use to control the number of healthcare locations in a specific area. Applicants for new facilities must demonstrate that a community need exists before a project is approved.

“They were well-meaning laws created in the 1970s, but over time have been misused to limit ASC growth and protect the interests of established healthcare systems,” says Dr. Ahmed. “They need to be abolished, which would be the closest thing we have to a panacea when it comes to our industry’s movement to expand.”

Noncompetes, which essentially mandate that physicians can’t work within a certain radius of the hospital they once worked at for a set period of time, also limit ASC growth, he says. The FTC recently moved to abolish most noncompetes for top employees, but numerous court challenges will likely delay its implementation for years, or possibly rule that it cannot be put into place at all. State governments will continue to enforce laws surrounding noncompete agreements in the meantime.

“I think the change will come,” says Dr. Ahmed. “The right thing to do is the right thing to do. It’s important that patients understand that ultimately any cost inefficiencies will always come back to them to pay for.” OSM