On June 1st, Gastroenterology Specialists of Birmingham (GSE), a practice which includes Drs. Rohit Malik, Mukul Mehra, William Lopez, and Mohit Mehra, along with nurse practitioners Tiffany Purdy and Stacey Branham, has joined Gastroenterology Associates N.A.P.C (GANA).
The merger will provide benefits for both groups. The additional doctors at the St. Vincent's East location will help increase patient access, allowing the group to provide same or next-day service when needed.
And the doctors from GSE bring two areas of specialization to GANA.
"Dr. Mukul Mehra received post-fellowship procedural training in endoscopic retrograde cholangio pancreatography (ERCP)," said Miles Gresham, MD, president of GANA. "He is one of the true experts in that technique. He brings that in to serve our broader group which is now 17 doctors with seven at eastern.
"And Dr. Mohit Mehra brings advanced training in endoscopic ultrasound. He'll join Dr. Brian Brunson who also has that training. This makes it easier for GANA to provide this service.
"Also, the GSE doctors will benefit from the very active infusion center we have at our Brookwood office. They did not have access to that before."
Both practices will benefit from some economies of scale, particularly in the areas of information technology and compliance. Compliance has become increasingly important to medical practices as CMS adds regulations, and GANA has in-house compliance and IT officers which the smaller group lacked. Likewise, the group believes they can achieve some economies of scale in billing and collections.
Fortunately, the two practices use the same EHR system, which has facilitated the transfer of records, and means that the new doctors will not have to learn a new system.
GSE and GANA both have offices near the St. Vincent's East campus, and they are in the process of merging the two physical offices, which will be a multi-year task because of leases and build-out.
