Becker's Spine Review

16 SPINE LEADERSHIP Shriners Hospital for Children Names Dr. Purnendu Gupta Chief of Staff: 5 Key Notes By Laura Dyrda S hriners Hospitals for Children in Oak Park (Ill.) named Purnendu Gupta, MD, chief of staff, according to a Chicago Tribune report. Here are five things to know about Dr. Gupta: 1. Dr. Gupta focuses on complex spinal dis- orders and has conducted extensive spine research. He is published in e Spine Jour- nal and Clinical Biomechanics. He has also served on the editorial boards for multiple professional journals. 2. roughout his career, Dr. Gupta has volunteered for e Founda- tion of Orthopedics and Complex Spine in Ghana and the Scoliosis Research Society Global Outreach Program in Bulgaria. 3. In his new role, Dr. Gupta wants to build Chicago Shriners Hospi- tal into a "preeminent pediatric hospital" in Chicago for orthopedics, plastic surgery and spine rehabilitation, according this report. 4. Dr. Gupta earned his medical degree at Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago and completed his orthopedic surgery res- idency at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. His additional training in- cludes fellowships in complex scoliosis and spinal disorders at Washing- ton University Medical School in St. Louis, Barnes Jewish Hospital, St. Louis Children's Hospital and Shriners Hospital for Children – St. Louis. 5. In addition to his clinical practice, Dr. Gupta spent more than 20 years in academic medicine at Ohio State University and previously served as Chicago-based Weiss Memorial Hospital's spine center di- rector. He continues to serve as a clinical professor of orthopedic sur- gery at the University of Illinois, Chicago. n Spine Surgery Costs: 5 Key Notes on Surgeon Variation By Laura Dyrda T he cost per surgeon for spine surgery varies from surgeon-to-surgeon. But as a high-dollar procedure — accounting for $90 billion in healthcare expendi- tures in the United States — variation won't be tolerated in the move toward value-based care. A new article published in Spine examines intersurgeon variation for 1,241 elective spine surgeries at one facility for three years. The researchers found: 1. There was an unadjusted cost per surgeon variation by a factor of 1.32 to 1.81 between lowest and highest cost surgeons. The cost depended on the procedure. The lowest variation was for posterior laminectomies and the highest was for posterior lumbar decompression and fusion. 2. The variation between surgeons was 1.31 times when ad- justing for patient features and procedure. 3. There were seven surgeons with sufficient patient vol- ume, and one was significantly less costly than the others, costing $1,462 less per procedure. 4. Three surgeons cost more than average: • Surgeon one: $685 more • Surgeon two: $839 more • Surgeon three: $702 more 5. The factors driving the total variation were largely sup- ply and operating room costs; but the actual drivers were surgeon-specific. "Data on procedure-level variation should be discussed with individual surgeons to shift practice pat- terns," concluded the study authors. "Finally, the compari- son methodology can be applied to other procedures and specialties." Procedures examined in the study included anterior cervi- cal discectomy and fusion, posterior lumbar decompres- sion and fusion, posterior laminectomies and lumbar dis- cectomies. n Dr. Purnendu Gupta "Data on procedure-level variation should be discussed with individual surgeons to shift practice patterns."

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