Clinical Component

Navigating the Clinical Component

The current need is due to Ochsner’s substantial need for Urologic services, both clinically and procedurally focused. There is currently over a 3 month wait time for new patients and the current Urologist rotates in for one day a month from the neighboring Slidell community in Louisiana. They are doing a very full single clinic day when they are in town, but outside of that, there is no immediate Urology presence in the community outside of Gulfport Memorial.

This outpatient only Urology position that will be employed through Ochsner Hancock. The incoming physician we be located at the Bay St. Louis location for your clinic and OR time. This No Call position is extremely rare in the field of Urology. This luxury allows the flexibility for a physician and their family to live in New Orleans or anywhere between there and Bay St Louis – though living directly on the beach in beautiful Bay St. Louis is an easy sell while still being an hour from New Orleans and the airport.

This Urologist can expect to take over a very established practice from the rotating Urologist who does all general Urology, including kidney stones, incontinence, prostate cancer, BPH and erectile dysfunction. Once the incoming physician gets familiar with their workspace and work flow, the Ochsner team expects a quick ramp-up period of 3-6 months.

AdText Breakdown:

Be Busy Day 1 – Ideal Situation Taking over Existing Practice
Bread & Butter Urology Practice with Advanced Robotics Available (Xi/Si)
Salary Guarantee from the Hospital with Uncapped Income Potential
Flexible Schedule Available
Schedule your Own O.R. and Clinic Days
No Call Position! ER & Hospitalist do all Manage/Admits
Hospital Employed Position with Physician Lead Health System
Ability to Block 2 ORs and have 2 Days of OR Time Per Week
104 Bed Hospital, Level 4 Trauma Center, 20K ED Visits w/ 10% Admission Rate (10K Urgent Care)
Expect 5 Operative Cases A Week from the ED
Anesthesiologist Manages CRNA Team for All Cases
Onsite CT, 1.5T MR, Dexascan, Digital Mammography, Mobile PET
20+ Primary Care Physicians Referring
Current Physicians State their “Work/Life Balance is Hard to Beat”
Ability to live directly on one of the most beautiful beaches in the country and live in a beautiful resort destination location.
Great Schools in area including Parochial dual All Boys & All Girls 7-12th Schools with International Students & Marine Science Program
200,000 Area Population, 25% Lower Cost of Living, 3 Local Yacht Clubs, Hundreds of High End Houses including Waterfront/Beachfront Options
Lively High-End Luxury Restaurants and Cultural Activities Year-Round
Live 30 Minutes Away in the larger nearby suburbs and commute.
Live 1 Hour Away in one of the most highly sought after Major Metros in the SE USA and Commute (No Call makes this possible)
Beautiful Newly Remodeled International Airport, NBA and NFL Professional Sports, Theater, Symphony, Opera, and Nationally Recognized World-Class Culinary Cuisine and Shopping

Your office and primary responsibilities will be in a private office space in the Ochsner Hancock Hospital. The ideal schedule is Monday-Friday 8:00 am – 5:00 pm with 36 hours of patient contact per week, but the group is very flexible with hours worked, as most of the support staff in clinic are out of the office by 4pm on an average clinic day. Flexible schedule or 4-day work week may be available. You will have significant amounts of freedom and autonomy associated with your practice and will have the full support of the hospital, including research opportunities. The incoming candidate must be comfortable in all aspects of general Urology. This Urologist will be expected to do all general and procedural Urology, with two DaVinci SI robots and one XI robot available to schedule time on within the surrounding community, specifically at Slidell and Gulfport. Procedures include Robotic Assisted Surgery, Extracorporeal Shock Wave Lithotripsy, Laser therapies, and HIFU (High Intensity Focused Ultrasound). Urodynamics and other specialty Urology options are also available and will be discussed with administration should the provider wish to have them available.

Ochsner’s primary care physicians and specialists have no doubt that you will be busy from day one. There are over 20 primary care physicians in the immediate area that will be prepared to refer patients to the incoming physician from day one.

Call: This position will require a Urologist to take ZERO hospital call at this time. There may be the occasional phone call to request phone consult within an hour or so after clinic, but there are rarely any instances where a Urologist will be expected to come back to the hospital after his or her clinic day is completed. With hospitalists like Dr. Copeland doing admits and rounding in the ED, you can rest assured that your presenting patients are in good hands and, at worst case, will be added to your clinic day the following morning.

We have one urologist here every other week for clinic and one day a month for procedures. We also have an NP doing a clinic every other week. Our urology cases go to Slidell and Gulfport.

Dedicated women’s health center.

Dedicated GYN Surgeon is booked out 2 months.

As soon as the PCP doctors know you are here, you should expect at least 3-5 operative cases a week. We have 15 PCP and APPs that will refer cases to you. The Gulfport primary care doctors across the parking lot would also send some of their patients to us, just because we are closer. That would be in addition to the ER volumes. Ideally you could expect to have a few short days of surgery, that would also help increase volumes due to your availability. We have a great mix of patients from the lowest end of the socioeconomic scale to the very well to do.

Emergency Medicine
6a-6p-Single EM doctor coverage
6p-6a-Single EM doctor coverage
10a-10p-APP

We have 20K annual visits and a low acuity mix. This is due to the fact we have a lot of healthy, active older people. Approximately 35% of our ED patients are more of an urgent care related issue and not emergent. However, it was shared with us that the urology service volume is more reflective of an ED that has 35K annual visits. Our admission rate is about 10% and our transfer rate is 4-6% of all patients. Overall, the patient population is very nice. The highest volume of transfers has come from cardiology, GI and urology. We don’t need someone to be on call at night. The EM doctors know when to call the urologist. We very rarely need a urologist after hours. We can hold them in the ER until the morning arrives.

We typically transfer out 1-2 operative cases a week without a urologist in town. If the population knew we had a urologist, then the volume of urology cases that came to our hospital would be closer to 3-5 operative cases a week. A lot of those cases would be stones. The ambulance drivers would bring the cases here, and not Gulfport about 20 miles to the east, where there are 3 urologists. If our new urologist is flexible and wants to do add on cases, the volume will also grow quicker. About one third of our patients are here part time or just passing through. About two thirds are the local residents.

Hospitalist Service
7 on/7 off-12-hour shifts with after-hours virtual coverage

We spent some time speaking with Dr. Copeland (U of MS-Undergraduate/MD, Tulane Residency), the lead hospitalist. He is very easy to work with and does a great job managing our inpatients. We have a nocturnist service that is covered remotely. If there is a critical care issue that Dr. Copeland can’t handle, he is just a phone call away from a critical care phone consult. Dr. Copeland does most critical care procedures, with paracentesis being done by radiology, and intubation/central lines done by ER/ANES, but Dr. Copeland will run the codes. There are no anesthesia services over the weekend.

You should expect this job to be an easier pace than a very busy service. Just being available from 8a-4p will get you more business. This is not a practice with a full day of inpatient consults, some days none, some days 3-5. You should be busy enough to have a full complement of urology cases. Our hospitalist service has an average daily census of about 16-20 with an APP that helps out.

On the inpatient side, we have transferred large obstruction stones and testicular abscess. Post operatively Dr. Copeland manages the patient and will only call you if something comes up where he needs your opinion. The urology service is a consultative service and the hospitalists will admit and manage your patients.

No surgical ICU or eICU coverage.

Radiology is in house M-F and after hours and weekends with a Nighthawk service.

1.5T MR, 64 slice CT, 4 ultrasounds, dexascan, two 3D mammos

We have a mobile lithotripsy unit that used to come every Friday. We will get that up and running again with our new provider on an as needed basis.

Surgery/Procedures
On the day of surgery, patients begin to report at 6:30a to our 6 bed pre operative area. We have a 7 bed recovery area. They typically wait about 45 minutes before their procedure starts. We do the pre anesthesia visits 24-48 hour in advance. We have 3 OR and 2 endoscopy suites, with one OR being oversized.

We have a scrub technician and RN on each case. We have a MD (1)/CRNA (3) model with Dr. Dang supervising the CRNA team. Dr. Dang has 30 years of experience. Dang takes care of the pre-op, peri-op and post-op. He is comfortable with any type of case that is scheduled. They typically finish cases by 3p, but can stay until 5p-6p for add ons. For all scheduled patients, Dr. Dang will review that file as soon as it is scheduled. He is very thorough and makes sure the patient is ready for the procedure.

Tuesday is the busiest day with Orthopedics and pain procedures. Every third Friday, out GI comes to town. General surgery is here on Monday and Wednesday and podiatry comes on Friday.

Make sure to get Dr. Petre-GS involved in your IV itinerary.