Becker's Healthcare January 16, 2026
Revision hip and knee replacements, long considered too complex, risky and expensive to move out of hospitals, are now entering a new frontier: ASCs for Medicare patients.
A federal Medicare payment rule that took effect Jan. 1 expanded the procedures eligible for reimbursement in ASCs, pushing more complex orthopedic cases into outpatient settings. The change reflects how far outpatient joint replacement has evolved, but it also raises the stakes for surgery centers now expected to manage cases that can swing from straightforward to highly complex.
“These were the last procedures we were not able to do at an ambulatory surgery center,” Craig Della Valle, MD, chief of adult reconstructive surgery at Chicago-based Rush University Medical Center, said. “If you had...
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