Rebecca Artz

Many neurosurgeons are facing practice environments that are radically different from the ones they have known for years, or perhaps decades. Much of this is being driven in the name of medicine’s newest mantra: value. Too many neurosurgeons enter into these new situations expecting their intelligence and education, along with the flourishing practices they have developed, to be sufficient...

The National Neurosurgery Quality & Outcomes Database (N2QOD) is the NeuroPoint Alliance’s (NPA) largest continuous effort — designed to collect and generate high-quality neurosurgical patient outcomes data. Currently, there are over 75 sites throughout the U.S. now reporting data through N2QOD. More than 25,000 patients have enrolled in the spine registry across 54 participating spine centers. The cerebrovascular registry...

Lado Tsikarishvili, MD, is a senior neurosurgeon consultant at M. Iashvili Children’s Hospital and is head of the neurosurgery department at Medical Center Lancet in Tbilisi, Georgia. For the December 2015 issue of AANS Neurosurgeon, Jamie Van Gompel, MD, interviewed him for his perspective on the challenges neurosurgeons face in Georgia, his practice, the types of cases he works on and...

We have all been there — rehearsing the impending conversation in our heads before entering a room full of people we have either never met or only met briefly in clinic. Furthermore, I imagine we can all remember the emotionally draining process of learning how to handle these meaningful discussions.  Lastly, many of us probably recall very specific cases that...

A senior resident of mine used to comment that after surgery, patients are either, “coming along, holding their own or zero delta.” This tongue-in-cheek formulation may be useful, simplified shorthand for residents on a busy service. But, of course, it glosses over the difficulties patients and families have dealing with neurosurgical conditions, with or without surgery. Most, if not...

“I can’t say enough good things about Dr. Knightly,” said Joanne Matina, who used to experience such excruciating back pain that she wanted to “jump off a mountain.” She believed her life was over, as intervention after intervention failed to stop her pain. She later let John Knightly, MD, FAANS, perform what was the fourth operation on her back, hoping...

Jessica Gebhardt was 31-years-old in May 2014 when she was the driver in a motor vehicle accident (car versus tree) resulting in polytrauma. Her Glasgow Coma Scale grade was six upon EMS arrival at the scene. After prolonged extrication, she was intubated on the scene and transported via helicopter to the University of Toledo Medical Center (Level One Trauma...

Following the theme of this issue, I am going to depart from the standard topics of coding and reimbursement policies for this edition of Coding Clarity, and point out a number of problems with the recently published ProPublica and Consumers’ Checkbook surgeon scorecards. I hope the readers will forgive me for spending some time on a soapbox…Poor Execution and...

Editor’s Note: To read another perspective on measuring patient satisfaction, read “Counterpoint: Patient Surveys are Good.”The unsustainable cost of health care in the U.S. has led to an unprecedented shift towards value-based reform. Central to this reform era is adoption of quality measurement and profiling with the aim to incentivize and reward patient-centered, high-quality care. While all stakeholders agree...

Editor’s Note: To read another perspective on measuring patient satisfaction, read “Point: Patient Satisfaction Surveys: Measuring Patient Contentment with Health-care Service, Not Quality and Value of Neurosurgical Care.”There are few things that the federal government has built, or required of us in practice, that have actually improved health care and reduced costs while proving to be functional and efficient....