The Future of Endoscopic Spine Surgery: An Interview with Choll Kim, MD, PhD

Dr. Kim outlines his extensive experience in adopting endoscopic spine surgery and reflects on barriers to widespread adoption, including the learning curve and reimbursement challenges

Endoscopic and arthroscopic technology has been around for a number of years, aiding surgeons’ visualization to treat patients in much less invasive ways than were previously possible. Prior to the introduction and adoption of these types of technology, surgeons were faced with invasive, more traumatic procedures and sometimes limitations on visualization based on anatomy. Less invasive approaches have allowed patients to benefit from less risk, shorter hospital stays and, in many cases, quicker healing.

Endoscopic approaches to spine surgery have been taking place for 10+ years, but the market hasn’t experienced transformative growth. All the patient benefits align with relative adoption trends, so why haven’t we seen endoscopic spine surgery grow at a similar rate? What does the future look like in this segment? SmartTRAK sat down with minimally invasive spine surgery pioneer Choll Kim, MD, PhD to explore his thoughts on focusing his minimally invasive surgical practice around specific offering of endoscopic spinal techniques, what the pros and cons have been within the adoption curve of the technology and where he thinks the market is headed.

SmartTRAK's spine experts will be roaming the floor at NASS 2022, bringing our subscribers real-time news direct from the show. We'll also be on the show floor at booth #2341, ready to answer your questions, share insights on the latest news and innovations in the Spine Market and discuss how SmartTRAK can help you Be the Expert in your market.  If you would like to book a meeting with us at NASS, please click here.

Continue reading to find out how to download a complete transcript of SmartTRAK's interview with Dr. Kim.

Interview:

SmartTRAK: So go back, probably 10 years or so ago, to when you first started putting endoscopy into your spine practice. What initially drew your interest to it at the time? And what specific techniques interested you within the space at the time?

Choll Kim, MD: I think the main reason is that it allowed me to distinguish myself, because I'm always trying to stay a little bit ahead of everybody to try to distinguish myself in terms of what I can offer. Endoscopic surgery was a big leap in technology and minimally invasiveness of a procedure. And the procedure was mainly treating herniated discs.

What were some of the considerations when you were in the process of learning about the technique and pursuing adoption?

CK: It's a technically very difficult surgery to learn for a variety of reasons and adopt. And the learning curve is really difficult. It's both steep and long. That's the worst combination. But once you climb that learning curve, the patient outcomes are dramatically good. Another factor is its competing surgery, the microdiscectomy, which is, depending on who you ask, the second-best surgery period, the best being a total hip replacement.

How would you define success?

CK: It’s all about patient satisfaction. Doesn't matter what the scores are. You want to create an army of evangelists, like iPhone people that stand in line to get the new iPhone. That's it boiled down to - bottom line of what I consider success. I want patients to be happy, I want them to be satisfied to the point where they're evangelists for my practice.

It’s relatively well paying and well reimbursing, which can be an issue, but I carved out private payments and it's something that fits into my future lifestyle goals. I don't know if you remember, but ...

To download and read the rest of this fascinating interview with Choll Kim, MD, PhD about "The Future of Endoscopic Spine Surgery", in which he discusses, among other things:

• Treating patients with endoscopic microdiscectomy
• The biggest clinical learning curves
• What makes it such a technically challenging procedure
• The biggest “ah ha” moments for the procedure
• Training activities for surgeons 
• His overall take on endoscopic surgery technology for spine 

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