Integrating Pain Management Into Anesthesia Services
Opioids have long been a highly effective pain management method. However, they are not the ideal first step or a long-term solution to pain. Many community hospitals constantly need to find alternatives to offer patients facing dire pain situations. Integrating pain management within anesthesia services is one potential route to improving patient care.
Integrating pain management services into an anesthesia practice enables patients to benefit from improved care while offering hospital efficiency benefits. Patients receive the support they need while avoiding the risks associated with opioid dependency. It creates additional revenue streams for practices looking to expand their services.
Benefits of Integrated Pain Management and Anesthesia Services
Anesthesiologists can provide diverse pain management strategies for individuals, including both preventative treatment and acute surgical pain. They can also create strategies to deal with chronic pain and work to avoid the onset of such pain in the first place. Consider some of the benefits of integrating pain management into your anesthesia services.
- Improve patient experience. By offering these services, you create a better level and type of care for your patients, helping them to be comfortable when they need support.
- Improve workflow and efficiency within your organization. By incorporating pain management into your anesthesia services, you can create efficiencies and minimize wait times without adding a new department.
- Expert care is already available. Anesthesiologists have the unique ability to provide pain management strategies for all types and causes of pain, and they already have a varied assortment of methods to address most patient needs.
- Integrating pain management into anesthesia minimizes the need for additional compliance layers. Implementing a single set of compliance requirements creates less compliance risk.
- Care is personalized for the patient, creating more exacting and effective solutions. Integrating these services allows patients to receive support based on their circumstances.
- It is cost-effective. For most organizations, costs matter, and integrating pain management into your anesthesia department is a cost-effective way of providing critical services while trimming the budget as needed.
Contact CCI Anesthesia now to find out how well the integration of pain management and anesthesia can work for your community hospital.
Key Considerations for Integration
To ensure efficiency and effectiveness throughout this process, consider these best practices. Place a significant emphasis on individualized, patient-centered care. This includes finding a balance between services and treatment modalities.
Focus on a multidisciplinary approach as the next step. Pain management strategies differ in effectiveness across all people. By offering a multi-modal approach, including nerve blocks, medications and physical therapy in the same location, care is comprehensive and cohesive from one step to the next.
Consider the importance of overcoming stigma. Stigma is a common barrier to pain treatment, requiring organizations to offer compassionate and empathetic care centered on a strong patient-clinician relationship.
A feasibility study is also necessary. Outline specific factors such as shared space and resources, demand for both services and the potential cost-effectiveness of the integration. Careful consideration of costs is key before integrating. In a smaller community hospital, treating both services are possible with carefully executed plans.
Also, the practical applications of this process should be considered. Determine equipment and space management early on. Typically using similar tools and resources, these two departments often easily integrate. Depending on the advancement of your services, this may be an opportunity to upgrade to more advanced, modern pain treatment methods. The integration of these services can help improve hospital efficiency.
How CCI Anesthesia Supports Hospitals in Integration
CCI Anesthesia provides comprehensive anesthesia practice management, billing and consulting services. We help community hospitals provide improved patient-centric care, reduce costs and become more profitable. Talk to us today about integrating pain management into anesthesia services in your community and the potential benefits it can offer your facility.