Author
Changes made earlier this year to the Alabama State Health Plan included revising the criterion for determining need for additional outpatient operating rooms (ORs) for ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs). The 2024-2027 State Health Plan (see page 131) requires all ORs in a planning area to have a projected average utilization rate of 70%, or an average of 945 cases per room for the planning horizon three (3) years after the most recent reported year of data before a new ASC can be approved. The number of ORs the methodology indicates are needed equals the number of ORs needed to decrease the average number of cases per room in the county to 945 cases per year. Moreover, no applicant for the establishment of a new multi-specialty ASC will be approved for fewer than four (4) operating rooms.
This requirement does not apply to adding ORs to establish or expand an outpatient hospital surgical department (HSD). Nor does the methodology apply to a hospital seeking to convert up to four (4) of its existing HSD-based operating rooms to establish a hospital-owned ASC.
This requirement will make it difficult to develop new multi-specialty ASCs in many areas of Alabama. However, the requirement does not apply to new single-specialty ASCs with four or fewer ORs.
This gives single-specialty physician practices the opportunity to develop new ASCs. Single-specialty ASCs must still provide evidence that the proposed ASC is needed in the service area, but the applicant does not have to satisfy the 70% utilization requirement.
Healthcare Management Associates (HMA), led by Jim Stidham, provides development services for ASC projects “from concept to keys.” HMA works in partnership with RPC which provides Certificate of Need (CON) services to healthcare providers and attorneys nationally. RPC and HMA have worked on successful single-specialty ASC projects in Alabama, including an ophthalmic ASC and Alabama’s first ASC-based cardiac catheterization laboratory. Our team’s services include:
- Assessment of financial feasibility and preparation of loan request package
- Recommendations regarding the preferred organizational structure
- Space planning and programming to include required elements
- Equipment planning
- Preparation of CON applications and testimony
- Operational management services
Contact me at 512-371-8011 or dschaeffer@rpcconsulting.com if RPC or HMA can help you with a case.