MESSAGE FROM THE CEO
Supporting Clinical Excellence A
s we begin to close out 2013 and prepare for next year, I am pleased to present this issue of ASC Focus dedicated to clinical excellence. Top-quality patient care and patient outcomes have long been hallmarks of the ASC community, and this final issue of ASCA’s magazine this year is a tribute to the outstanding track record that ASCs have established in this area. To support the work that you do, ASCA offers many resources. One that is key is benchmarking. The fully online ASCA Benchmarking tool that we introduced this year has made this process easy and accessible, and individual ASCs across the country are beginning to recognize the value that this new program offers. If your ASC is not involved, I encourage you to get involved. Go to
www.ascassociation.org/ASCABenchmarking for the information you need. Of course, collecting and comparing data is just one part of the benchmarking
process. To learn more about how to benchmark and how to convert the data reports that ASCA Benchmarking participants receive into meaningful improvements in your ASC, turn to the article that begins on page 14. For more tools and techniques that your ASC can use to support advancements in clinical care, turn to page 18 to read about adding hip arthroscopy to your ASC and to page 34 to learn about how to manage patient allergies. You can also read about how to choose the right EMR system on page 10, how to handle documentation overload on page 22, best practices for patient follow-up on page 24, tips on post- procedure payment negotiations on page 28 and health care laundry standards and safety on page 26.
Also look into the other resources that ASCA provides to support you in provid- ing high quality care. Visit our web site (
www.ascassociation.org) to find out more about our webinar series, our online professional networking community ASCA Connect, the coding seminar that we will offer January 16–18, in Las Vegas next year and our annual meeting, ASCA 2014, in Nashville, May 14–17. To learn more about the coding seminar, go to page 20 and to read about ASCA 2014, see page 8. To make sure that you are taking advantage of all that ASCA offers, please
make certain that we have your email address on file. If you are not receiving our weekly e-newsletters—the ASCA News Digest and the ASCA Government Affairs Update—please send your email address to
asc@ascassociation.org and ask to be added to those distribution lists. The updates and reminder notices that these pub- lications contain can save your ASC time and money and lead to improvements in your patient care. Finally, I want to thank you for being a part of ASCA in 2013 and remind you that
Seeking Authors
ASC Focus is seeking the contribution of articles by guest authors. If you have the expertise and time to write for us, we’d be interested in hearing from you. Please see our editorial guidelines at
www.ascassociation.org/Focus and submit your story proposal to
smukerji@ascassociation.org.
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if you haven’t already renewed your ASCA membership for 2014, you should renew today. Together, we can continue to raise the bar on the top-quality patient care that ASCs deliver and continue to support the high quality, lower cost health care deliv- ery model that ASCs represent.
Bill Prentice Chief Executive Officer
ASC FOCUS NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2013
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