PODCAST · business
This Week in Surgery Centers
by This Week In Surgery Centers
If you’re in the ASC industry, then you’re in the right place. Every episode, our hosts will recap the important news and data impacting ASCs, and share an interesting conversation we had with an expert from the industry. Check back often for new episodes!
Episodes
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What It Takes to Build and Lead an ASC From the Ground Up
Here's what to expect on this week's episode. 🎙️ Amy Swaffer, Director at Knoxville Spine Surgery Center, joins us from HST Connect to share what it took to move from 22 years at a Level I trauma center into the ASC industry and help build a de novo surgery center from the ground up. Amy breaks...
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What the NO PAIN Act Means for ASCs
Here's what to expect on this week's episode. 🎙️ Terry Ross, Group President, Prevention & Recovery at Enovis, joins us to break down what the NO PAIN Act means for ASCs. He explains how the law creates a Medicare reimbursement pathway for qualifying opioid-sparing treatments and what centers...
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How ASCs Can Use AI to Turn Data Into Action
Here's what to expect on this week's episode. 🎙️ Matthew Obenhaus is SVP of Design & Engineering at NueHealth, where his work spans product development, artificial intelligence, and direct surgery center operations. Matt joins us for the next installment of our Trust the Data series to explain…
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Six Emerging Trends Shaping ASC Performance
Here's what to expect on this week's episode. 🎙️ We’re kicking off a short series called Trust the Data by sharing an excerpt from a recent webinar we hosted for our referral partners. During the presentation, Ryan walks through findings from HST’s most recent State of the ASC Industry Report.…
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How ASCs Can Reduce Anesthesia Subsidy Pressure
Here's what to expect on this week's episode. 🎙️ Dr. Brian Cohen, practicing anesthesiologist and founding member and administrative chief of Miami Anesthesia Services, and Lee Kortmansky, Site Administrator at Physician Outpatient Surgery Center, join Grant Duncan to discuss one of the biggest...
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What Lenders Want to See Before You Expand
Eric Gonzales and Alexandra DeHart are healthcare banking leaders at Columbia Bank, where they work with healthcare organizations on financing, growth, and capital planning. Eric and Alexandra join us this week to break down how ASC leaders should think about funding growth. They walk through the...
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Using Quality Data to Improve ASC Operations
Quality data can be one of the most powerful tools an ASC has to improve both safety and operations. In this episode, Nina Goins, Executive Director of the ASC Quality Collaboration, explains how centers can use benchmarking data to uncover deeper operational issues, strengthen payer and board...
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Should You Make That Investment?
Sean Hartzell is a Managing Director at VMG Health, where he advises healthcare organizations on strategy and capital planning. Sean joins us this week to break down how ASC leaders should think about funding growth. He walks through the key differences between debt and equity, how to calculate…
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How ASC Sale-Leasebacks Work
Jon Vick is the Founder and Principal of ASC Realty Advisors, where he has spent decades advising physicians and ASC operators on healthcare real estate strategy. Jon joins us this week to explain how ASC sale-leasebacks work and why they are becoming an increasingly relevant strategy for…
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Inside the ASC Deal Process: From LOI to Close
Stephanie Tarry brings more than three decades of experience in the ASC industry. Now with Physician Transaction Advisors, she works closely with physician groups to evaluate partnership opportunities and guide them through the transaction process from start to finish. In this episode, she breaks...
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The Power Shift After CON Reform
Dr. Leo Spector, MD, MBA, is the CEO of OrthoCarolina, where he leads strategy across a growing network of ASCs while continuing to practice as a spine surgeon. With decades of experience navigating joint ventures and certificate-of-need restrictions, Dr. Spector brings a physician-leader...
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Preparing for a Transaction and Valuating Your ASC
Jim Freund is the Managing Partner at Physician Transaction Advisors, where he and his team have spent more than 20 years advising physician-owned surgery centers through transactions, partnerships, and long-term strategic planning. Having worked on hundreds of ASC deals across the country, Jim...
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How Anesthesia Costs Reshape ASC Growth
Anesthesia costs and staffing pressures are reshaping ASC operations. In this episode, Garrison Gordon and Cory Hollmann break down shifting reimbursement, rising subsidies, and evolving partnership models between surgery centers and anesthesia groups. Learn practical strategies to align...
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Patient Payments: Workflow Best Practices for Maximizing Collections
Patient payments are getting messier — not always because patients won’t pay, but because the workflow is full of friction, surprises, and missed follow-through. In this episode, HST experts talk about what really works for top-performing ASCs: clearer upfront estimates, fewer handoffs, easier…
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Patient Payments: Moving from Manual to Modern
Patient payments don’t have to be complicated. In this week's episode, we kick off our Patient Payments series with a practical guest conversation on what “good” looks like in 2026: integrated processing, fewer manual steps, faster reconciliation, and an easier way for patients to pay. We cover...
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What to Know About CMS's 2026 Final Rule for ASCs
If you’ve been looking for a clear, ASC-focused breakdown of the 2026 CMS final payment rule, this episode is for you. This week, ASCA’s Chief Advocacy Officer, Kara Newbury, joins us to break down the most important things ASC leaders should note coming out of the 1600+ page document (all in…
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2025 Highlights: 30 Guests on One Thing You Can Do This Week
If you only had time to do one thing this week to improve your surgery center, what should it be? To kick off the countdown to year-end, This Week in Surgery Centers pulls together a year’s worth of conversations into one rapid-fire episode, featuring input from 30 past guests on the closing...
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From Case Costing to Profit Forecasting
In the third installment of our case costing series, HST Pathways’ Chief Innovation Officer, Gavin Fabian, breaks down what “mature” case costing actually looks like in a real ASC (and why, done right, it’s pretty boring). The conversation covers why so many initiatives fall apart at the…
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Case Costing: Creating a Clean Inventory Master
In this week’s episode, the second installment in our case costing series, Grant Duncan sits down with VMG Health’s Vanessa Sindell and Nancy Stephens to unpack the unsung hero of accurate case costing: a clean inventory master. They cover practical, do-it-today tactics like using naming...
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The 3 Case Costing Levers: Implants, Supplies & Staffing
This week’s guest, Melissa Rice, is the administrator at Loyola Ambulatory Surgery Center at Oakbrook Terrace (part of Trinity Health), and the newly elected Illinois Ambulatory Surgery Center Association President. In the first episode of our Case Costing series, Melissa lays out a practical...
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Live from New York: Perspectives from a Surgeon, an ASC Leader & a Policy Expert
Recorded live at the New York State Association of Ambulatory Surgery Centers conference in Albany, NY (Oct 6-8), this special edition episode brings three vantage points on where ambulatory surgery is headed next: Dr. Daniel Choi of Spine Medicine & Surgery of Long Island on scaling a...
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Who's on Your Schedule? Exploring Demographic Data for ASCs
This week, Will Evans, Head of Data Science & Insights at HST Pathways, joins us to unpack our new five-and-a-half-year look at how case volume, OR minutes, and dollars are distributed across patient demographics. We discuss the biggest findings, a few surprises, and the simple metrics any ASC…
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AI in Action: Improving OR Utilization at Beverly Hills ASC
In this episode, Benita Tapia, Administrator & Director of Nursing at Beverly Hills ASC, joins Alex — along with Conor McGinn, CEO of Akara — to unpack how she’s using AI to improve everyday operations: tightening block utilization and surgeon accountability, speeding turnovers, answering...
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ASC Market Brief: Policy, People, and the Path to 2026
As Q3 wraps, this episode spotlights the signals that matter for ASC leaders heading into the busiest quarter of the year. We track policy direction, the continued shift of cases to outpatient settings, and how employer data transparency is accelerating site-of-care redirection. We scan market...
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Improving the Patient Experience: Best Practices for Pre-Assessment Workflows
For the final episode of our Improving the Patient Experience series, show co-host Grant Duncan and Marta Shultz, a clinical workflow expert at HST Pathways, join Alex to unpack pre-assessments — why they’re essential for patient safety and satisfaction, when to complete them, how many forms you...
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Improving the Patient Experience: Gramercy's Patient-First Culture & New York's ASC Momentum
Jeffrey Flynn, Administrator and Chief Operating Officer at Gramercy Surgery Center and President of the New York State Association of Ambulatory Surgery Centers, joins the show to share how Gramercy keeps care personal at scale — training every team member as a patient advocate, keeping families...
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Improving the Patient Experience: Clinic and ASC Communication
In this episode, Grant Duncan sits down with Katie Sypher, a registered dietitian and healthcare operations leader, and Michael McClain, founder of LeftCoast Healthcare Advisors, to tackle one of the most overlooked challenges in the ASC space: communication. They share practical strategies for...
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Anesthesia: Driving Surgical Volume
Colleen Ramirez, Chief Administrative Officer at Bone & Joint Surgery Center of Novi, and Dr. Michael Bernard, Director of Anesthesia, join the show to share how they work together to drive case volume, choose which cases to accept, and stay profitable—all while maintaining a strong clinical...
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Anesthesia: Building an In-House Team
This week, we’re joined by Wes Battiste, an experienced anesthesiologist and ASC developer, to talk about a growing trend: surgery centers building their own in-house anesthesia teams. What once seemed like a wild idea is now becoming the best path forward for centers looking to stay profitable....
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The CMS 2026 Proposed Payment Rule for ASCs
Alex Taira from ASCA breaks down the key takeaways from CMS's 2026 Proposed Payment Rule for ASCs. From reimbursement rates to the ASC Covered Procedures List and quality reporting changes, Alex shares what ASC leaders need to know from the 913-page proposal. In our news recap, we highlight an...
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Maximizing OR Utilization in Ortho ASCs
This week, ASC expert Carol Hiatt joins us to share practical tips for improving OR utilization in orthopedic surgery centers. With over 30 years in the industry, Carol dives into common causes of underutilization and how to fix them. Then in our Data & Insights segment, we spotlight dental ASCs....
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The 8-Step Software Evaluation Checklist
Kevin Turner is the Sr. VP of IT & Analytics at HealthCrest Surgical Management. He has been in IT for over 30 years and has been through the software evaluation process countless times. Kevin shares with us his repeatable, proven, 8-step process that anyone can use to guide their software...
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Highlight Reel – 15 Tips to Improve Your Surgery Center
At the end of every discussion, we always ask our guests, “What is one thing our listeners can do this week to improve their surgery centers?” For today’s episode, we took the last 15 answers we received from our guests and turned them into a 20-minute highlight reel. This roundup features, in...
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ASCA Session Recap: Advanced Financial Strategies
Will Evans, HST’s Senior Director of Data Science and Insights, is fresh off presenting Advanced Financial Strategies at last month’s ASCA conference. I wanted to spend a few minutes with Will recapping the second half of that presentation for those who may have missed it, including four key...
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Smarter Credentialing Strategies
Nyleen Flores, CEO of MedElevate, and Shannen Reyes, President of Advanced Quality Compliance, are joining us today. With decades of experience between them, Nyleen and Shannen have helped countless surgery centers streamline their credentialing processes, reducing risk and improving patient…
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Behind the Scenes of Opening an ASC
Josh Rudd recently opened Knoxville Spine Surgery Center, his first time leading the launch of a brand-new facility. I sat down with Josh to hear what the process was really like, from the initial idea all the way to their very first procedure. Whether you're planning a new build or just curious...
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Improving Profitability: Reducing Days in AR
We’re continuing our series on Improving Profitability. Last week, Melanie Howitt shared how AI and automation can improve your ability to collect outstanding balances. This week, Kristle Young from Collective RCM joins us to discuss strategies for reducing days in AR. In our news recap, we cover...
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Improving Profitability: Automating Claim Adjudication
We’re kicking off a brand-new three-part series on Improving Profitability at Your ASC. First up: Melanie Howitt, Transition and Implementation Manager at in2itive, joins host Nick Latz to discuss how AI and automation can streamline collections and reduce outstanding balances. She also shares...
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A Comprehensive Look at ASC Data from 2024
HST CEO David Thawley recently joined ASCA’s podcast to discuss key ASC trends in 2024—from rising specializations and OR efficiencies to new RCM data from our State of the Industry Report. We’re excited to share that conversation here with permission from ASCA. Quick reminder: if you’re…
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Life Safety: What Admins Need to Know
Today’s guest is Richard Parker, Associate Director of Life Safety & Physical Environment at ACHC—the Accreditation Commission for Health Care. We talk about what life safety includes, what surveyors are really looking for, how to document properly, and the most common deficiencies ACHC sees…
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Staffing: Locum, Contract, or Permanent?
In the final episode of our Staffing Strategies series, Maddie Traylor, President of AdvancedScope, joins us to explore the differences between locum, contract, and permanent hires. We dive into the pros and cons of each staffing model and how surgery centers can determine the best fit based on...
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Staffing: Building a Sustainable Culture
Last week, we explored how to choose the best staffing agency with Mayte Rechani. This week, we’re continuing our staffing series with Mark Henderson Leary to discuss what it takes to build a sustainable culture at your ASC. Mark shares practical strategies to help you: Define what your culture...
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Staffing: Selecting the Best Agency
Today is the first episode of our new three-part series on Staffing Strategies for ASCs! Over the next few episodes, we’ll discuss key staffing considerations that can help surgery centers build and maintain a strong workforce. The healthcare industry is dealing with unprecedented staffing...
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ASC Leader Expectations for 2025
Today, we’re diving into the latest insights from VMG Health’s newly released report, ASC Leader Expectations for 2025. This report is based on a survey of 137 ASC leaders—including administrators, CEOs, VPs, and clinical directors—from both independent and joint-venture centers. To break down…
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Opening a New ASC: Step-by-Step Design Guide
Ryan Short, Principal and Founding Member of Cotton Architecture and Design, joins us to break down the step-by-step design process for opening a new surgery center. In this fast-paced, 20-minute conversation, we cover everything you need to know. Whether you plan to open a facility, expand an...
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QAPI Studies: A Study on GI Case Cancellations
In the final installment of our three-part QAPI studies series, I sit down with Kathy Wilson, Executive Director of the ASC Quality Collaboration, and Kathy walks us through a real-life QAPI study on reducing case cancellations at a GI center, using her 10-step, repeatable approach that…
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QAPI Studies: What Surveyors Are Looking For
We are continuing our three-part series about QAPI studies. Last week, we heard from Becky Ziegler-Otis, who shared some fantastic insights into how you can generate new ideas. And today, I had the chance to talk with Tina DiMarino. Tina is the CEO of Custom Surgical Consultants, a Board member…
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QAPI Studies: Finding New Ideas
We’re kicking off a new three-part series on QAPI Studies! Becky Ziegler-Otis joins us this week to share practical tips for generating new study ideas. Becky is the Assistant Executive Director at the ASC Quality Collaboration, an ASC consultant, and a member of the ASCA Education Committee....
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Payor Contracts: Chargemaster Essentials
Scott Allen is the SVP of Managed Care at nimble, and he’s on today’s show to help us wrap up our Payor Contract series. We have already covered 6 Tips for Effective Management and Leveraging Data for Negotiations, and we’ll finish up the series by doing a deep dive into Chargemaster Essentials....
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Highlight Reel – 20 Tips to Improve Your Surgery Center
This week marks our 100th episode of This Week in Surgery Centers! We are beyond grateful to everyone who has tuned in and to our 80+ guests who have come on the show over the last two years. Our episodes have accumulated tens of thousands of listens, and it has been our privilege to share such...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
If you’re in the ASC industry, then you’re in the right place. Every episode, our hosts will recap the important news and data impacting ASCs, and share an interesting conversation we had with an expert from the industry. Check back often for new episodes!
HOSTED BY
This Week In Surgery Centers
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does This Week in Surgery Centers have?
This Week in Surgery Centers currently has 150 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is This Week in Surgery Centers about?
If you’re in the ASC industry, then you’re in the right place. Every episode, our hosts will recap the important news and data impacting ASCs, and share an interesting conversation we had with an expert from the industry. Check back often for new episodes!
How often does This Week in Surgery Centers release new episodes?
This Week in Surgery Centers publishes regularly with 150 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to This Week in Surgery Centers?
You can listen to This Week in Surgery Centers on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts This Week in Surgery Centers?
This Week in Surgery Centers is created and hosted by This Week In Surgery Centers.
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