Acute Care Surgical Programs: Expanding Surgical Care
As hospitals continue to deal with pay-for-performance, accountable care and population health management, it’s vitally important for them to consider how emergency surgery services are delivered and how it impacts their success.
One new resource on this topic is an article I recently wrote for the inaugural issue of Management in Healthcare, a new peer-reviewed journal. The article examines how, by implementing the service model developed for trauma and applied to emergency surgeries, it is possible for hospital’s most at-risk patient groups to receive standardized care according to best practices and practice management guidelines 24/7.
The result: high-quality care and better performance outcomes for the hospital. Plus, continuous quality improvement initiatives that touch multiple hospital departments, raising the bar on performance throughout the facility.
This new model for acute care surgery, also referred to as surgicalist programs, can help hospitals achieve results, as well as enhance their competitive position. Metrics show that a well-structured surgical hospitalist program can improve patient outcomes and improve costs. For example, a July 2014 paper in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons highlighted how a surgical hospitalist program produced sustainable results, including a 31% reduction in hospital costs and complications declined by 43%.
