BOSTON — athenahealth announced Thursday the launch of athenaOne for ambulatory surgery centers, a new healthcare technology solution designed to connect physician practices and outpatient surgical facilities through a single platform.
The system integrates clinical, administrative and financial workflows, allowing healthcare providers to coordinate patient care across physician offices and ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) while reducing the need for separate software systems.
The launch comes as an increasing number of surgical procedures move from hospitals to outpatient settings, creating greater demand for technology that connects patient records, scheduling, surgical documentation and billing.
athenaOne for ASCs is designed primarily for surgery centers that operate alongside physician practices, allowing patients to move from an initial specialist consultation through surgery and postoperative follow-up within a connected system.
“For physician practices that operate surgery centers, the ASC doesn’t operate in isolation. The patient journey often begins in the clinic, continues through surgery, and extends to the clinic for follow-up care,” said Chad Dodd, vice president of product management at athenahealth.
“Our opportunity is to connect that journey. By bringing surgical workflows into the athenaOne platform, we help clinicians and staff work from a shared view of the patient, improve care coordination, and reduce the administrative burden of disconnected systems. That means less time navigating separate systems and more focus on the patient throughout their care,” Dodd added.
The new platform allows clinical teams to access a single patient record across both physician practices and surgery centers, keeping medical histories, documentation and other patient information synchronized.
Clinicians can also use a consistent interface across both settings, reducing the need to learn multiple software systems or switch between applications during daily operations.
The platform includes single sign-on capabilities and shared scheduling tools, allowing staff to manage appointments and surgical procedures within the same system.
Surgical orders initiated during a physician visit can be linked directly to the corresponding procedure at the surgery center, giving care teams access to relevant documentation and patient information.
Once a procedure is completed, the system automatically closes the surgical order and updates the patient’s surgical history, reducing manual data entry and administrative work.
The solution also integrates revenue cycle management across physician practices and surgery centers.
Healthcare organizations can use the same billing platform for both professional and facility services, with capabilities to automatically separate claims associated with physician care and surgical facility charges.
The system also provides combined operational reporting, allowing administrators to review clinical and financial performance across both settings.
Dr. Ankur Patel, CEO and managing partner of Southern Pain and Spine, said the platform has helped his organization reduce paperwork and improve operational efficiency.
“Many pain practices still rely on paper in the ASC. Using athenaOne across our clinics and surgery centers has made documentation cleaner and easier, reduced opportunities for error, and helped our teams move more efficiently from procedure ordering through authorization, documentation, and billing,” Patel said.
“Closing notes faster means our billing team can submit claims sooner, reconcile payments more easily, and collect revenue faster,” he added.
athenahealth said it will provide specialized implementation and operational support to help surgery centers adopt the platform.
Teams with expertise in outpatient surgical workflows will assist customers with system configuration, clinical processes, performance monitoring and troubleshooting.
The company also plans to incorporate feedback from healthcare organizations through customer research, product testing, site visits and a dedicated ambulatory surgery center user group.
The launch represents part of athenahealth’s broader investment in outpatient surgical technology, with additional features expected to be introduced as the platform develops.
By connecting physician practices and surgery centers through a shared technology infrastructure, athenahealth aims to simplify administrative operations and improve continuity of care as more medical procedures shift to outpatient facilities.
