Editor's Note A successful cholecystectomy March 11 in Santiago, Chile marked the first reported use of augmented reality (AR) technology for abdominal surgery, Fox News reported on April 12. Developed by Levita Magnetics, a medical equipment manufacturer in Silicon Valley, the MARS system paired with Meta’s Quest 3 XR headset…

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Editor's Note The Bonati Spine Institute, based in Hudson, Florida, filed a $500 million lawsuit in federal court against the state of Florida, Business Observer April 4 reports. The lawsuit accuses the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) of wrongful shutdown, civil rights violations, conspiracy, defamation, and libel. This…

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Editor's Note There are certain patients and clinical situations that may require anesthesiologists to say no to performing surgery in the outpatient/ambulatory setting, Anesthesiology News April 4 reports. At the 2023 annual meeting of the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA), BobbieJean Sweitzer, MD, a professor of medical education at the…

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Editor's Note The OR Manager Conference 2024 is a premier learning opportunity for ambulatory and outpatient surgery leaders, taking place October 28-30, 2024, in Las Vegas, Nevada. An approved provider of Ambulatory Education Units (AEUs) by the Board of Ambulatory Surgery Certification (BASC), attendees can earn up to ten AEUs,…

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Editor's Note Adverse events are a ubiquitous, inevitable consequence of surgical practice, and more must be done to support surgeons before and after they occur. This is the central message of a video published March 27 by Urology Times, in which British urologist Kevin Turner, MA DM FRCS, of Royal…

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Editor's Note The practice of concierge physicians is expanding as thousands of doctors at large hospital systems shift to a model facilitating high fees and decreased patient load, according to an April 1 report in KFF Health News. The concierge physician model began decades ago in wealthy areas of Florida…

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Editor's Note Gastrointestinal endoscopy could increase the risk of aspirational pneumonia in patients using GLP-1 receptor agonists (RAs) to manage weight or treat diabetes, according to an April 1 report from MedPage today. Citing research published in the journal Gastroenterology by a team led by Kevin Sheng-Kai Ma, DDS, of…

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Editor's Note Although OR Manager is dedicated to providing the education perioperative leaders need to succeed, we can’t do that without your input. Our annual Salary/Career survey, now open for 2024, makes it easy for you to provide that input—and in the process, get a chance to win one of…

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Editor's Note Private payers initially deny reimbursement on 15% of claims, only to later approve more than half of those initial denials, according to a national survey of healthcare institutions published March 21 by Premiere, Inc. Additionally, the denied claims on average tend to be more prevalent for higher-cost treatments…

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Editor's Note Patients with biliary symptoms can benefit from laparoscopic cholecystectomy even with a normal ejection fraction (greater than 35%), according to a study published November 30 in the American Journal of Surgery. Although previous data have shown the surgery to improve biliary symptoms (such as abdominal pain) in patients…

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