Piedmont Physicians Group named a top performing national practice
For the sixth consecutive year, Piedmont Physicians Group has been named as a national top performing physician practice by the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA).
Piedmont Physicians Group (PPG), a more than 80-member primary care physician group with 25 locations throughout metro Atlanta, received the “best practices” honor for its superior services, functions and processes compared to other medical group practices nationwide.
The MGMA report provides benchmarking data on better-performing medical groups and identifies the business practices and behaviors these groups employ to achieve success. PPG is among the top medical group practices in the U.S. in the area of accounts receivable and collections. PPG’s accounts receivable were less than the average 120 days of all the physician practices and they excelled in charging competitive fees for services compared to the rest of the physician practices.
The MGMA report profiles medical practices that have demonstrated success in one or more areas: profitability and cost management; productivity, capacity and staffing; accounts receivable and collections; patient satisfaction; and managed care operations.
Northside offers new MRIs, robotic surgery
Northside Hospital-Atlanta now offers MRIs to detect ruptures in silicone gel-filled breast implants and has expanded its robotic surgery program to include thoracic procedures, recently performing its first thymectomy (removal of the thymus gland).
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved the marketing of silicone gel-filled breast implants made by two companies for breast reconstruction in women of all ages and breast augmentation in women ages 22 and older.
The FDA recommends women with these implants receive regular screening MRI examinations to detect whether silent rupture of the implants has occurred. Woman should have their first MRI three years after the initial implant surgery and every two years thereafter.
Northside Hospital performs more than 400,000 imaging exams annually and is highly respected by the medical community for its state-of-the-art imaging technology. In 2007-08, Northside ranked number one with metro Atlanta consumers in the National Research Corporation’s Healthcare Market Guide Study.
Through Picture Archiving and Communications System technology, Northside radiologists, specialized in breast imaging, read all images, regardless of their location. The technology also allows the radiologist and patient’s physician to view images and confer from separate locations, resulting in a quicker diagnosis and treatment plan.
Used for thoracic, urologic and gynecologic surgical procedures, computer-assisted robotics technology enables surgeons to perform minimally invasive procedures, while preserving and improving the visualization techniques of open surgery.
Patients benefit from smaller incisions, shorter hospital stays and recovery time, less pain and scarring, less blood loss and reduced risk of infection.
More surgeries are performed at Northside Hospital than at any other hospital in Georgia. Northside also leads the state in robotic surgery – performing more robotic procedures than any other Georgia hospital – and ranks in the top 5 percent of all robotic gynecology in the country.