Specialized Care With An Emphasis On Quality

May 21, 2013 11:04 pm

Few things are more comforting to a patient than an experienced, well-trained physician and a high-quality facility with a full complement of services. The NeuroMedical Center provides both. The health care facility is the largest of its kind in the region, offering a team of highly regarded neuroscience experts focused on specialized care for the brain, spine and nervous system.

Located in a modern, state-of-the-art facility
in Perkins Rowe, The NeuroMedical Center is actually three facilities in one: a clinic, a surgical hospital and a rehabilitation hospital. Twenty- seven physicians and more than 400 health care and administrative employees staff the facility, which treats about 25,000 patients from Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi each year, says clinic CEO Nancy Kelly.
“The growth has been astounding since we were originally founded,” says Kelly. “It’s remarkable to have this many fellowship-trained, board-certified physicians with so many sub-specialties under one
roof.”

Opened in 1978, the NeuroMedical Center is the brainchild of Dr. Thomas Flynn, a Baton Rouge neurosurgeon who believed in the idea of a group practice focused exclusively on the neurosciences.

Critics doubted him; the dominant health care trend at the time was the large multidisciplinary group practice. But Flynn persisted and recruited two other neurosurgeons and a neurologist, forming The Baton Rouge Neurological and Neurosurgical Associates. It was first located downtown. The physician-owned group
was renamed The NeuroMedical Center in 1986, and after moving twice and continuing to grow, its leadership opened a new ground-up facility in Perkins Rowe in 2004.

The clinic houses adult and pediatric neurosurgeons;
neurologists; physical medicine and rehabilitation/pain medicine physicians; neuropsychologists and neuroradiologists. Their
patients seek diagnosis and treatment for a wide variety of neurological problems including dementia,
stroke, back pain, brain tumors, depression, headaches and migraines, epilepsy, ALS, Parkinson’s disease and many others.

The NeuroMedical Center Surgical Hospital includes 23 patient beds and four operating rooms for spinal and neck surgeries, carpal tunnel surgery and pituitary tumor removal surgery. The hospital also features three pain procedure rooms for epidural and joint injections and other pain medicine treatments, such as for migraines and multiple sclerosis therapy. Moreover, a sleep center in the hospital enables physicians to help diagnose patients with sleep apnea and narcolepsy.

Surgical hospital CEO Rob Blair says the facility sets the gold standard in regional neurological care.

“This model, the physician-owned surgical hospital, is incredibly effective because we can influence the quality of what we’re doing so much easier. Nationwide, hospitals like ours are seeing great results, including a lower nurse-to-patient ratio, better outcomes and a lower infection rate than acute care hospitals.”
The NeuroMedical Center also houses an in-house lab, a pharmacy and an advanced technology imaging center.

“When you have everything under one roof, you not only make life easier for patients, but you control quality,” says Blair.
The imaging center’s equipment includes a computed tomography (CT) scan and three 3 Tesla magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines, which provide accurate and precise imaging. Physicians themselves—not just technicians—are on site to read results and guide the process.

The Center’s third component is a 27-bed rehabilitation hospital, administrated by Jay Ivey, RN, which serves patients recovering from strokes, brain or spinal cord injuries, amputations, orthopedic and post-joint replacement recovery, and a wide range of other conditions.

The NeuroMedical Center features neurosurgery satellite clinic locations in Eunice, Hammond, Gonzales and St. Francisville, plus outpatient physical therapy services at the clinic on South Harrell’s Ferry Road in Baton Rouge
and in Gonzales.

-Baton Rouge Business Report

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