DOCTORS' PARK SURGERY WANTS PHO MEMBERSHIP

Doctors' Park Surgery wants to be part of a regional physician hospital organization in the making.

Ron Witmer, the president of Doctors' Park Surgery, said the center has been working to control medical costs since opening in 1976.

The ambulatory surgery center in Cape Girardeau is waiting for word from the forming PHO.

Dr. William Shell, president of the PHO, said he sees no problems with Doctors' Park Surgery being part of the PHO, but the PHO needs more time to establish guidelines.

MedAmerica HealthNet Inc. is the region's first PHO. It is bringing together hospitals in Cape Girardeau, Sikeston, Perryville and Dexter with area doctors to offer lower medical costs.

In January and again in August Witmer wrote letters to PHO organizers expressing a desire to join. The response: Please wait.

"We're proud of the fact that we've been implementing the same principles and working on cost savings since 1976," Witmer said. "These are the same things the PHO is now trying to establish."

Their work has paid off for patients, shows a consumer buyers guide produced by Missouri's Department of Health. Doctors' Park Surgery ranked among the least expensive for outpatient surgery procedures.

"I don't think there will be any problem," Shell said. "We just have not had time to look at these other organizations."

Shell said organizations like Doctors' Park Surgery could likely be included in the PHO as an associate provider. Other entities in that category could include pharmacies, home health providers and physical therapists.

"We are interested in getting a lot of different providers; no one has been excluded," Shell said.

The outpatient surgery center wouldn't be a hospital member. "But they could be within the network," he said. "It would be very similar."

Shell said recruiting and signing associate provider members has been on a back burner this summer as the PHO organizers worked to get an insurance plan together.

"We are interested in quality, cost-effective participants," he said.