Becker's ASC Review

Executive Briefing: 52 EXECUTIVE BRIEFING 4 EXECUTIVE BRIEFING on his or her back table, as well as per SPD. [The impact on] throughput is that you're able to get many more things done in one washer or sterilization load versus two," Mr. Martz said. Orthopedic ASCs and other similarly specialized surgical facilities have smaller SPD teams, despite the ever-increasing case volume. As a result, maintaining efficiency and quality assurance may be especially difficult using traditional trays in a traditional workflow. "For a smaller organization like ours, it's very hard to get approval to hire more people in the SPD, even if surgical volumes are growing. That made us look at other ways to be efficient and one of those was to reduce the number of trays we were sterilizing," Mr. Fries said, explaining how OrthoIndy leadership made the decision to begin using EZ-TRAX™ for total knee procedures. "That reduced the workload for my SPD techs." Mr. Fries added that using EZ-TRAX™ provides a practical, consistent pathway for SPD managers to, "push your vendors to customize their trays which reduces the instrumentation to ONLY what the physician is truly using and reduces the amount of additional trays that just might have one or two things in it." The Team Approach Diversity of facilities, staff roles, and vendor relations allow for a collaborative approach at yielding the best solutions for a specific challenges. Mr. Martz explained how he approaches such conversations. "Usually, I have an initial meeting with somebody from the SPD to find out if there are any problems that they're facing on a day- to-day basis. Then I'm able to give them examples of how we've addressed [that problem] in other places. Hearing about how a place down the street or in another state [has tackled the same problem] gives them someone to relate to and shows how ONE TRAY® and EZ-TRAX™ may be able to help." In tandem with ONE TRAY®, EZ-TRAX™ addresses the problem of instrument prioritization and organization, but solutions begin with the leadership, staff commitment, and early vendor involvement. "As far as what ONE TRAY® and EZ-TRAX™ can do, it's almost customizable to your needs, but you have to be proactive with education and training so the entire team knows the right way to use the products." Mr. Martz added, "The instrument vendor of choice for that hospital or ASC has to be involved in the decision-making process." He also noted that other relevant personnel are important to that discussion including the SPD manager, an SPD technician who specializes in orthopedic instrumentation sets, and an OR orthopedic coordinator or scrub technician. "It's great to involve the surgeon, too," Mr. Martz said. "That's not always possible early on, but if they would like to be in the conversation, I always obviously give that opportunity." Conclusion With the steady advance of value-based care models, hospital and surgery centers are faced with growing pressures to be more cost-efficient while maintaining high quality of care standards. Surgical centers must, simultaneously, continue to migrate from better-resourced but costlier hospital facilities to ASCs. The confluence of these trends challenges SPDs to process more surgical instrumentation sets without additional staff or sterilization equipment. Adopting innovative solutions, like ONE TRAY® and EZ-TRAX™, will allow SPDs to manage elevated demands more efficiently and maintain operational stability. n ONE TRAY® provides a solution that allows facilities to meet demands head on by processing loaner, consignment, and high turn hospital instrumentation in a fraction of the time it takes sterile wrap or other rigid containers. American Made and backed by our Lifetime Warranty, ONE TRAY® is committed to providing years of effective and reliable service. Partner this with EZ-TRAX™ and MAXIMIZE reprocessing of orthopedic sets with the ability to take 6-8 trays down to approximately 2-3 trays. Increase cases per day, do MORE surgeries in LESS trays and mitigate cancellations and delays with ONE TRAY® and EZ-TRAX™. Condoc_359

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