As One Surgical Center Closes, Another Opens
Florida's first ASC says goodbye as a persistent eye doc claims victory.
D
ays after
Florida's first
freestanding
surgical center
announced it was clos-
ing its doors last
month after a 43-year
run, an Iowa ophthal-
mologist finally got
state permission to
reopen his freestand-
ing center for eye sur-
gery after a 10-year fight to obtain a certificate of need.
One door closes, one door opens. Isn't that how they say life goes?
But we celebrate both the death notice for the pioneering doctors in
Florida and the birth announcement for the persevering doctor in
Iowa.
In 1974, a group of 26 physicians on staff at Memorial Hospital in
Hollywood, Fla., bolted the big box to build the Ambulatory Surgical
Facility. It was Florida's first freestanding ambulatory surgical center,
built 4 years after the nation's first ambulatory surgery center opened
in Phoenix, Ariz., in 1970. Many surgeons would follow the path those
docs blazed in Florida. Today there are nearly 450 ASCs in the state.
The founding group of surgeons saw the opportunity to bring effi-
ciency to surgery. OR space to perform elective surgeries was in huge
demand. Some doctors found their patients had to wait as long as 6
weeks to get elective surgery in area hospitals. It was not unusual for
emergencies to bump outpatient cases.
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 • A U G U S T 2 0 1 7
Editor's Page
Dan O'Connor
• STICKTOITIVENESS Ophthalmologist Lee Birchansky, MD, has finally received a certificate of need to
reopen an eye surgery center.
