When the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law, many ambulatory surgery center (ASC) leaders viewed it with optimism because it requires everyone to have health insurance unless they choose to pay a penalty. “We thought this would be a very positive thing because we would see an increase in insured patients and an increase in volume because patients could afford to get the care they needed,” says Martha Colen, MBA, BSN, CASC, administrator of the multispecialty Virginia Beach Ambulatory Surgery Center, Virginia Beach, Virginia, which performs about 3,000 cases a year.
