Certified Physicians Discuss Benefits Of MD Anderson Cancer Network®

Patel: So, Dr. Sabaugh, what value benefit will it bring to be a certified physician or to the Premier Health Organization?

Sabaugh: It benefits both myself and Premier and the patients actually, all. As a certified member of M.D. Anderson Cancer Network, you have somebody looking at your quality and you get notification periodically that your certification is ongoing based on checking your quality. So to me, it ensures my quality of care for my cancer patients is what it should be. Following guidelines and protocols and staging and all of that. For the organization for Premier definitely also does help because. That level of confidence I have in the quality of care I'm doing will translate to a better quality of care throughout Premier, and the patients definitely will see the benefit of that. So it benefits both personal and for Premier and our patients.

Patel: So Dr. Sabaugh, presenting a case and multidisciplinary conference and M.D. Anderson Cancer Network, what do you will benefit compared to a regional conference?

Sabaugh: So with M.D. Anderson Cancer Network, that multidisciplinary conferences and tumor boards, it's actually a level higher than our tumor board and that gives you access to expertize to some specialists. And that, in turn, improves the quality for what to do for our patients and many times in our local tumor board, with Premier, a question will come about the case, and the medical oncologist presenting would say, Well, I'm going to present to that and M.D. Anderson Cancer Network of the disciplinary conference. And they all get back to you with the answer. So having that level of resource you can go back to, it's actually directly benefiting our own local tumor board and you know, subsequently that quality of care we offer our patients. So it's definitely an added value to all of us.

Patel: Is it directly guidelines or based on the experience of rare cases of physician directly providing input?

Sabaugh: So it's not only guidelines, but the expertise as you know you, the guidelines are there and they follow the guidelines. They tell us the guidelines, but also they add on top of that, their personal experience and what they had seen and they're in their own practice. So it's multi-level. It's not just here what the book says. They have the guidelines. They have best practices available for their M.D. Cancer Network. You can access that anytime. But on top of that, you get the personal experience not just from the physician, but also for that particular case, because many times it could be a rare cancer we don't see much of, or it could be a patient who had multiple treatments. And now you're looking at, you know, beyond what else is available.

Patel: So thank you very much, Dr. Sabaugh, to providing information regarding to be a certified member and part of benefits regarding M.D. Anderson Cancer Network. Thank you, thank you for your time.

Sabaugh: You’re welcome.

Samuel: Tell me, what is it about the peer to peer reviews that makes you continue to engage with them?

Rodriguez: You know, the peer peer review is integral part of M.D. Anderson Cancer Network. One of those benefits that you have the certified physician, for example. I mean, we already in Premiere Health, we provide excellent care on quality for our patients. But sometimes, as you know, you have, these cases are very uncommon across your practice. And you know what to do with them. I mean, as a surgeon. But it's always great to have to approach one of the M.D. Anderson surgeons and ask a peer to peer question and review what you will do in this case.

So it's always great to have that positive feedback that their plans for neoadjuvant treatment or adjuvant treatment for your cancer patients is the same trend that you have. So I think the peer to peer review is an excellent benefit.

Samuel: Leading into that. I hear about the that Premiere Health has concordance studies. Can you talk a little bit about them and why they're important?

Rodriguez: This is very similar to the peer to peer and so they agree that is one of those benefits that when you use it is different. You increase and nudge your patient care and quality. So the concordance study is that review your charts and implementation and what do you do with patients, right? And they compare your pathway of cares with their pathway of cares. They tell you, Hey, you are not doing bronchoscopy in all your patient. You the 90% patient with everybody show, have a bronchoscopy. So or you are not documenting what carnival you are taking, for example. So that helped that to be able that to that, you're sure that you're doing everything that should be done in cancer care. So in the concordance study, then we compare how is our pathway of care? And we reinforce that we're doing the correct things for our patients. So keep our metrics, our quality, yeah, in the perfect path.

Samuel: And so is this part of the ongoing method that they use to make sure that the physician continues to be and meet those metrics of being a certified MD Anderson Network Physician?

Rodriguez: Yes. So naturally, I need to provide some charts every so often and then they review and they grade you. Hey, how you doing? You forgot to mention some lymph nodes in your documentation. Anyhow that you did it, but documentation that's important sometimes as patient care. Right? So how do you document things this part of your quality and your metrics. So. And then you change the way that you document it. So I think the concordance is very, very important.

Samuel: So basically what you're saying is they look at your charting based on the patient's diagnosis. Looking that you're giving the patient the correct procedure and that you're documenting it appropriately and basically ultimately giving the patient the best care that you as the phenomenal cardiothoracic surgeon can do.

Rodriguez: Correct, yes. So they want to be sure that you are following the guidelines and the protocols for the best cancer care for our patients. So you get graded, you keep the good grades and you continue to be a certified physician.

Samuel: Well, Dr. Rodriguez, thank you for your time and giving us some insight into what it means to be a certified physician with M.D. Anderson Cancer Network.

Rodriguez: Thank you. It was a pleasure to talk to you.

Musleh: So tell me what is this and the M.D. Anderson Certified Membership is all about.

Oulette: Really where the ad is, it may not come when you're actually doing their procedure or where we're trying to identify that diagnosis. Some of it really comes in the post diagnosis phase. If we're having trouble making a diagnosis, we may be able to get some additional suggestions. But really, after we make that diagnosis as cancer care has evolved and we all try to keep up our best with the evolution and the nuance of new treatments and also potentially new research protocols that may become available, we want to be able to have access to as much of that information and as much of those protocols as possible. Being connected with M.D. Anderson Cancer Network allows us to do a lot of that and allows us a really a direct access. We can really pull some of the world class expertise into some of the discussions that we have here locally in Dayton.

Musleh: Do you meet regularly with MD Anderson Cancer Network physicians like in tumor boards or different discussions? Do you have something regular that you do with them?

Oulette: So one of the benefits of being a certified member is that we participate in the network tumor boards. So just like our tumor boards that we have every week, there's also an M.D. Anderson Cancer Network tumor board. And that happens every week, and we can submit our cases from our own tumor boards or things we haven't even had a chance to discuss. And so that we get some input from the experts through the network. In addition to what we we assess and what we believe and what we see here, it gives that additional input, an additional set of eyes, so to speak, really just as a confirmation to make sure that we are getting it right. So really, with our combined expertise patient gets the optimal care close to home.

Musleh: Tell me why this MD Anderson Cancer Network certified membership is so important for me as a referring physician and for my patients.

Oulette: When our certified members have access to collaborating with individual physicians, we are able to then optimize and individualize the cancer care we provide for all of our patients here in the community. And the goal is to enhance the cancer care for all of our patients, our physicians, I think it's very important for our patients. And as we both know every day, we're trying to do the absolute best we can for each and every one of our patients. And so this is a way that we get to really enhance what we're trying to do every day.

DeGroat: What do you find to be most beneficial about being a certified physician with MD Anderson Cancer Network?

Steinmetz: When I have a patient that has a difficult situation with their care? I knew that I can have a peer to peer review and be reassured that the treatment I have planned for the patient is the correct one.

DeGroat: And patients are very anxious when it comes to a cancer diagnosis, and for them to be able to get that information so quickly is important.

Steinmetz: They are monitoring the quality of our program in our care. And so you can be you can be satisfied that the plan is not just coming perhaps from me and from national guidelines, but that they also will weigh in and and and ensure that what is being done is correct.

DeGroat: And typically, it's patients that are more that has a different diagnosis, a more complicated case. Nothing that it's it's not something that's straightforward. And then you're getting the reassurance by having the experts weigh in. And I typically tell my patients that this is a top hospital cancer hospital in the country.

Steinmetz: And I think for me, patients with rare diagnoses or something that maybe I don't see very often, and perhaps there's even national guidelines out there for it in their situations, the patient will know that their diagnosis perhaps is is rare.

Steinmetz: And so I can reassure them that I'm going to call these experts and discuss what I have planned for the patient and see if they would make any modifications. And regarding chart reviews from radiation oncologist perspective, M.D. Anderson continually reviews our radiation plans and critiques them to make sure that the actual plan on the patient is is satisfactory.

DeGroat: Right, yeah. To be a certified physician, you have to submit so many cases per quarter per year to make sure that you are following all the national treatment guidelines.

Steinmetz: Right. Our certified membership with MD Anderson Cancer Network brings prestige to Premiere Health.

DeGroat: You know, ultimately, it's all about providing the best patient care that we can possibly provide. And this is just another tool that we have available to us.