Outpatient Surgery Magazine

OR Excellence Awards 2016 - September 2016 - Subscribe to Outpatient Surgery Magazine

Outpatient Surgery Magazine, providing current information on Surgical Services, Surgical Facility Administration, Outpatient Surgery News and Trends, OR Excellence and more.

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dors, though a sealed-bid process prevents her from disclosing just how steep. Ms. Todd points out, however, that several of the physicians who had a say in the purchase were older practitioners, for whom the slick appeal of the latest, greatest technology may have held less appeal. Plus, as an orthopedic surgery facility that predominantly hosts small joint procedures, not laparoscopic abdominal cases, it may be possi- ble that ultra-high definition resolution is of less practical use in diag- nosing the anatomy, she says. Thomas L. Lyons, MD, MS, medical director of surgical services for Rockdale Medical Center in Conyers, Ga., also puts proof before price. "Surgery is vision. The better you can see, the better you are," he says. "We use high-def, all the cameras are high-def now. But unless you're routinely working off a 55-inch screen, the need to have ridiculously high resolution doesn't exist." He recalls taking part in a panel discussion on laparoscopic technol- ogy about 20 years ago. Even before image resolution had become a buzzword in minimally invasive ORs, the biomedical engineers on the panel explained that on smaller screens — say, 20 inches diagonal — there are limits on the differences that the human eye can discern, as far as pixel density is concerned. "I'm as addicted to technology as anybody out there," says Dr. Lyons. "In my own living room I have a 55-inch screen. But there I'm not working with it 2 to 3 feet in front of me." It's not an argument against 4K, he says, to consider how much bang you're getting for your buck. "Whenever you believe you can see bet- ter, it's probably better. But if you're going to sell me something, first you have to prove it's effectiveness. Second, you have to sell it at a price that is reasonable." "4K is not necessarily a need," says Mr. Bean. "But when you see it 1 1 8 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 6

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