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| Home > Healthy People > January 2004 |
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Winter 2004
New Spine Center offers multidisciplinary care for
spine patients
 St. John’s recently opened a
state-of-the-art multidisciplinary Spine Center on the third floor of the
new St. John’s Surgery Center at the corner of National and Seminole in
Springfield. The 25,000-square-foot space also houses the new headquarters
of St. John’s Center for Pain Management, which shares staff and works
hand-in-hand with the Spine Center to provide a “one-stop shop” for
patients with spine problems and the pain associated with such conditions.
The center includes 22 exam rooms, a radiology suite to provide instant
imaging for quick diagnoses and a physical therapy suite.
St. John’s Center for Pain Management, which has three locations and
previously had its headquarters in the Missouri Orthopedic Institute on
the St. John’s campus, is managed by anesthesiologists who are
board-certified in pain management and already provide pain management
services for many spine patients.
“Many of the procedures the Center for Pain Management’s anesthesiologists
perform, such as epidural blocks, are central nervous system and
spine-related. It only makes sense to deliver this care in one center to
have a continuum of care under one roof for these patients,” says Phyllis
Wiley, Spine Center and Center for Pain Management administrator.
Neurosurgeon
Bassam Hadi, M.D., and
St. John’s orthopedist
Todd Harbach, M.D., are the Spine Center’s medical
directors. Anesthesiologist
Ben Lampert, M.D.,
is the medical director for
the Center for Pain Management.
The Spine Center includes orthopedists, neurosurgeons, chiropractors,
physical therapists, occupational medicine specialists, physiatrists and
physical rehabilitation specialists, psychologists and pain control
specialists, all in one location, says
Alan Scarrow, MD, JD, who is the
co-medical director of St. John’s neurosurgery section with neurologist
Thomas Habiger, M.D.
After spine patients are referred to the Spine Center by their primary
care physician, they are evaluated, diagnosed and treated there, unless
their condition requires surgery. A case manager triages spine patients
and refers them to a St. John’s surgeon, the Center for Pain Management,
or to St. John’s physical medicine and rehabilitation services, depending
on the patient’s condition. Each discipline represented at the Spine
Center has quick access to confer with the professional staff from the
other Spine Center disciplines to provide seamless care for spine patients
in one location.
St. John’s integrated, comprehensive approach to spine care with the new
Spine Center is unique to the region, Hadi says.
Other Spine Center services include electromyography, which is a test that
measures muscle response to nervous stimulation (electrical activity
within muscle fibers) and pre-surgical screens.
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