Becker's ASC Review

12 ORTHOPEDICS How 1 spine surgeon launched his own practice after medical group closure By Carly Behm E arly in 2024, spine surgeon William Bradley, MD, said he learned he lost his job over a Zoom call. In March Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Health's physician group, Saltzer Health, closed its doors. So Dr. Bradley used the opportunity to do something that was always on his mind — opening a solo private practice. "It always was a consideration, but at the various times that I made career changes, there seemed to be other opportunities that were better," he told Becker's. Dr. Bradley saw his first patient at his new practice, Mountain West Spine Clinic, on May 1, he said. Mountain West Spine Clinic is about a mile away from where Dr. Bradley previously worked in Meridian, Idaho. Meridian has a population of 117,635, and the median household income is $89,683, according to the latest Census data. "Idaho is a relatively underserved medical community, and many of these people were in more rural areas that came in here at Saltzer," Dr. Bradley said. "ere wasn't a ready ability for the existing healthcare systems to absorb these people, and they're still scrambling and looking for primary and specialist care. It became quite obvious that the best way out of this was to roll up our sleeves and take it on ourselves to provide care for not only our existing patients, but others that needed help." One of the initial challenges Dr. Bradley faced was dealing with electronic medical records. "e greatest difficulty is the integration of electronic medical records and the trouble with obtaining imaging and medical records from our prior practice," he said. "e patients were le without their own records, and I was le without access to them … Trying to get medical records is not a straightforward, simple thing to do." But Dr. Bradley credited two groups that helped his practice hit the ground running. "e main one is called Independent Doctors of Idaho," he said "It was a group started to help support independent physician practices so they didn't become completely extinct in the area. e Independent Doctors of Idaho really made a huge difference to help provide education and resources and contacts and experience to start this. en I contracted with a management team called V2V Management Solutions that specializes in helping start up private practices. ose two groups really made it possible to get this done quickly and effectively." With his practice established, Dr. Bradley said he's thinking about the future. Along with bolstering administrative processes, he said he hopes to eventually add more staff and a surgical partner. "Now we need to sit back and figure out how we need to streamline care, charting and billing and collecting — the nuts and bolts of making sure the practice is sustainable," he said. "We've got demand and patient care is good and able to take care of them. But [now we're] making sure the back office stuff is taken care of." A spokesperson for Intermountain Health didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from Becker's. n Are spine, orthopedic surgeons exiting hospitals for private practice? By Laura Dyrda T en years ago, 70% of orthopedic surgeons were in private practice and 30% were employed; now, the inverse is true. That's a concern, but there is hope. "In the last two years, we've had three different physicians that have joined us from the health system," said Adam Berry, CEO of Summit Orthopedics in Minnesota, during a keynote panel at the Becker's 21st Annual Spine, Orthopedic & Pain Management-Driven ASC Conference in June. "When you talk about the pendulum swinging one direction or the other, I think there's a lot of different things that are going to be advantageous towards the independent groups." He said if independent groups have a solid financial footing and run operations smoothly, they'll be a great alternative for hospital-based physicians. Mike Boblitz, CEO of Tallahassee Orthopedic Clinic, is also seeing a trend of experienced physicians exiting the hospital and looking for another landing spot. "We're getting a lot of physicians as we speak joining the group that are mid-career, hospital employed physicians that feel like they don't have the autonomy," he said. The specialization of an orthopedic practice is attractive to those surgeons, who have been one aspect of a large medical faculty at the hospital. The ability to control their own destiny in private practice is also attractive. "We're finding people that have the desire to have entrepreneurship and ownership in their blood, sweat and tears, which is exciting," said Mr. Boblitz. n

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