'Streamline care': New surgery center in Peoria aims to offer boutique feel, convenience

PEORIA – Opening later this year, Springfield Clinic’s new Peoria Surgery Center will provide a convenient, economical option for many types of surgical procedures.

A group of Peoria-area surgeons is opening the center in the building that formerly housed Peoria Day Surgery Center at 7309 Knoxville Ave. The facility is being expanded and completely remodeled. It will have four operating rooms and six private rooms for patients who need to stay up to three nights after a procedure.

The center is one of only two ambulatory surgical centers in Illinois licensed to offer overnight care to patients.

“Surgery centers offer a much more efficient, value-based care for specific conditions where a patient would probably benefit from not having to be in a hospital, which can be much more complex or chaotic and oftentimes costly,” said Dr. Steven Tsoraides, one of the physicians opening the center. “If someone has a hernia or a bad knee, it’s very clear what they need done. They need to go in, have the procedure and be able to go home where they have a low risk of infection, and a cost that is very contained and focused around those conditions, and that’s where a surgery center fits in.”

What is Springfield Clinic?

Tsoraides, a colon and rectal surgeon, and his colleagues with the Peoria Surgical Group contracted with Springfield Clinic in 2021 to help run the business. Springfield Clinic works with entrepreneurial physicians by providing expertise and support to help them compete with larger medical organizations.

In the last three years, a number of Peoria-area physicians in a variety of specialties have begun working with Springfield Clinic.

“We are one of the few organizations that have actually survived the last few decades of hospital acquisition of physician practices,” said Tsoraides. “Springfield Clinic brings a lot of resources, leverage and support, so when you are sitting at the table negotiating with the hospital or an insurance company, they have to listen a little bit more. You also get to bundle expenses and resources. Instead of us, as a smaller organization, trying to recreate billing structures and administrative structures and marketing and all these other things, we are able to latch on to something bigger. And that comes with some savings as well.”

The arrangement is different in another key way – instead of protocols being dictated by the hospital system that has hired the doctor, protocols are determined by the doctor who owns the practice and is seeing the patients.

Expedited care

Springfield Clinic, which has managed the Springfield Ambulatory Care Center in Springfield since 1994, is a key partner in the effort to remodel and reopen the surgery center in Peoria. When Tsoraides and his colleagues learned that the Peoria facility was closing, they began formulating a plan with Springfield Clinic to take it over.

“It was a functioning surgery center in Peoria for decades, and for various reasons, it came under hard times and went into bankruptcy,” said Tsoraides. “To provide better care for our patients, we looked at that and said, ‘hey, this is going to give us an opportunity to streamline care for our patients.’"

In the wake of COVID and the great resignation, people are often waiting months for surgical procedures at area hospitals. The ambulatory surgical center will help fill the gap, said Tsoraides.

“We can get people in in days and weeks, not months,” he said.

A boutique experience

Construction is in full swing at the center, which is getting a sleek, modern makeover. Wide hallways and doors allow for easy access for everyone, and a covered circle driveway eases patient drop off, with parking just a few feet away.

The center will accommodate patients needing a variety of surgical procedures, including colonoscopies, appendectomies, hernia repair, hysterectomies and breast reconstructions, to name a few. State-of-the-art technology is being incorporated to expand the number of surgeries that can be performed at the center.

“We’ll be the first ambulatory surgical center in Peoria to have the Da Vinci surgical robot,” said Tsoraides. "That is something that is common in the hospital – I use it often in the hospital and so do my partners. But it adds a whole other spectrum of cases that you can do. It gives the surgeon a lot of control and accuracy over a procedure.”

Patients who need overnight care will be accommodated in comfort.

“The whole goal of the recovery care center is for it to really have a boutique-y, upscale feel,” said Jen Boyer, senior vice president of operations for Springfield Clinic.

Six private rooms each have a large, accessible bathroom. An on-site kitchen will provide meals, and a walking trail outside the building will give patients room to recuperate.

“The walking trail and some healing gardens are incorporated into the design,” said Cal Thomas, chief development officer for Springfield Clinic. “The recovery care center will have more comfort and luxury than you would get at a hospital, at a lower price.”

Leslie Renken can be reached at (309) 370-5087 or lrenken@pjstar.com. Follow her on Facebook.com/leslie.renken.

This article originally appeared on Journal Star: New surgery center opening in Peoria. Here are details