Becker’s Healthcare -- Spine and Orthopedic Podcast
Patrick Garman, Executive Administrator, Spartan Health Surgicenter
23 Nov 2025
This episode recorded live at Becker’s 31st Annual The Business and Operations of ASCs features Patrick Garman, Executive Administrator, Spartan Health Surgicenter. He discusses key forces driving ASC growth, the evolving role of technology, and how physician-led decision making shapes effective partnerships and long-term sustainability.
Chapter 1: What is Spartan Health Surgery Center and its significance?
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This is Gracelyn Keller with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast, and we are recording live at the 31st Annual Business and Operations of ASCs. I'm currently joined by Patrick Garman, who is the Executive Administrator at Spartan Health Surgery Center. So Patrick, thanks for being here. To kick us off, can you please share a little bit about yourself and your work in the ASC space?
Surely. Thank you for the invite. Spartan Health Surgery Center is in its 20th year. We celebrated our 20th year last September. We're a joint venture with a hospital partner, multi-specialty facility, 15,000 square feet, three ORs, two procedure rooms. We do a lot of GI, ophthalmology, pain management, orthopedics. We're located in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania market, Southwest Pennsylvania.
Wonderful. Well, thank you for taking the time. And let's start our conversation with the ASC market. In the U.S., it's projected to reach $60.8 billion by 2030 and continues to experience strong year-over-year growth. From your perspective, what are the most significant trends and market forces driving this expansion, and how should ASC leaders be preparing today?
Well, I think a lot of what's gonna propel this movement is physician choice. A transient physician population as the older physicians retire, the newer younger doctors are coming out of their fellowships and their residencies. Some of them are very entrepreneurial in spirit, which is very good thing for the surgery center market.
Every couple of years, the CMS Medicare model releases more procedures. That can be done, allowed to be done in the outpatient setting. That's providing great opportunity for surgery centers. 20 years ago, it was unheard of to be able to do orthopedic joints. Now my facility is doing them. A lot of facilities are being done. They're being done safely and actually better.
Now there's discussion about having cardiac procedures done in the surgery center setting, which is a phenomenal development and achievement. The cost savings is very apparent. It's very transparent. Surgery centers have a role in saving the healthcare system billions of dollars a year. The efficiency model pretty much was invented by surgery centers.
If hospitals only would take the chance, the opportunity to look at how surgery centers run an efficient method, they would probably reduce their cost as well. So All surgery centers are for profit. Very, very few are not for profit. The majority of the acute care hospital settings in the United States are not for profit.
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Chapter 2: What trends are driving the growth of the ASC market?
And it's all it is. It just benefits us in the industry to watch this technology unfold. It didn't happen 40 years ago, 20 years ago. So every two to three years, it continues to happen. It's very exciting to see. And it helps our patients out.
Awesome. And kind of a follow up to that, I'd love to dig in a little deeper. Can you identify one specific technology or innovation that stands out to you as especially transformative?
Well, to go from paper to electronics is very, very important. There was a lot of fight, a lot of pushback from the doctors. They didn't want to have to slow down. They'd rather whip a page and sign something. They don't have to type up this laptop and do all this stuff. But physician offices led the way.
Almost every physician office I know of, there's a laptop in the doctor's office, whether it's a pediatrician, a GP, orthopedic, neurology, whoever. That's... way it's happening. The hospitals all have sophisticated electronical matter where it's now. So the paper chart to paper chart format is really a thing in the past.
As far as other technology go, getting back to artificial intelligence and robotics, that's still finding its way because of its cost, because of its expense is finding its way. Not everyone's embraced it. Others have. So it's kind of 50 50.
Absolutely. And with 60 percent of health systems, Considering ASC joint ventures and many ASCs already partnering with systems in their communities, what opportunities do you see for collaboration, whether with providers or vendors, to strengthen patient care and operational efficiency?
Forming a joint venture with either a hospital system or a management company has to fit the needs of the doctors. The doctors, the surgeons are the single most important component. Without the doctors writing the prescription or the order to have the surgery performed, whether it's an admission at the hospital or a procedure in the surgery center, that's where it starts.
It's all centered around the doctor. My opinion, I've been in the field 35 years, the doctors rule. So that's why hospital groups try to employ them. That's why surgery centers were invented as an extension of physician practice and entrepreneurial spirit. So leave it up to the doctors.
If the doctors want a collaboration, if they think it makes sense to partner with a management company to get enhanced insurance contracts or cost savings on purchasing supplies, things like that, a bigger, larger network, if it makes sense to partner with a local hospital because the hospital would...
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