This Week in Surgery Centers: Mike Ferguson – Evaluating Ownership Options: Navigating Both Management Group and Hospital Ownership

Evaluating Ownership Options: Selling a Minority Stake

Here’s what to expect on this week’s episode. 🎙️

Mike Ferguson, President of Horizon Solutions, joins us to conclude our three-part series on Evaluating Ownership Options for ASCs.

As an ASC expert, Mike sheds light on one of the more complex ownership models—when physician owners, a third-party management group, and hospital partners are all involved. Does the saying ‘two’s company, three’s a crowd’ apply here, or is it possible that all three could work harmoniously towards the same goals? Here are some highlights from our discussion.

✅ Ownership Dynamics: Physician, hospital, and management group partnerships offer different benefits. While physician/management group partnerships allow for greater physician control, hospital involvement can provide access to better resources but often comes with hospitals seeking majority ownership (up to 51%).

✅ Referral Patterns & Financial Impact: Physician-hospital partnerships tend to face fewer referral challenges, and the 1/3 rule must be followed closely.

✅ Shared Decision-Making: In a multi-ownership model, decisions are made by a governing board composed of physicians, a management group representative, and a hospital representative. Operating agreements outline the rules and ensure decision power is distributed among the stakeholders.

✅ Leveraging Resources: Both hospitals and management groups bring valuable vendor contracts and expertise to reduce ASC costs, making these partnerships more resource-efficient.

Listen to the full episode for more details!

#SurgeryCenters #TWISC #ASC

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Welcome to this week in Surgery Centers. If you are in the ASC industry, then you are in the right place every week. We’ll start the episode off by sharing an interesting conversation we had with our featured guest, and then we’ll close the episode by recapping the latest news impacting surgery centers.

We’re excited to share with you what we have, so let’s get started and see what the industry’s been up to.

Erica: Hi everyone, here’s what you can expect on today’s episode. Mike Ferguson is the president of Horizon Solutions, which is a management group that works with ASCs and OBLs. He is on today’s show to help us wrap up our three part series on evaluating ownership options. There are so many possibilities when it comes to ASC ownership models when there are three parties involved.

Erica: So you have your physician owners, a third party management group, and then [00:01:00] hospital ownership. So Mike talks about how to navigate that dynamic, juggle differing opinions, and keep everyone happy and on the same page. In our news recap, we’ll cover ASCA’s comments for CMS on the 2025 Proposed Payment Rule, California’s new data exchange framework, where providers and payers are increasing their IT spending, and of course, end the news segment with a positive story about Aaron James, a man from Arkansas who received a whole eye transplant.

Erica: Hope everyone enjoys the episode and here’s what’s going on this week in Surgery Centers.

Erica: Hi, Mike. Welcome to the show.

Mike: Hey, thanks a lot. I’m happy to be here.

Erica: Can you please tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and Horizon Solutions?

Mike: I would gladly, sure. So my name is Mike Ferguson. I’m the president and co founder of [00:02:00] Horizon Solutions. We’ve been around since 2021. So we’re in, in the field of management companies, we’re a startup company.

Mike: I’ve been working in the OBL and ASC world since 2011, where I started and ran a division at a company called Spectranetics. And then Spectrum Next was purchased by Philips. And then I went over and took over the Philips Symphony Suite team in 2017. And then retired from Philips in 2021 to start Horizon Solutions.

Mike: Our company has one goal was to put the the physicians and the patients first and we look forward to having this conversation with you today.

Erica: Perfect. Thank you. So we are working our way through a series that is all about evaluating ownership options. We’ve covered MSOs and we’ve covered the benefits of selling a minority stake.

Erica: But I’m excited for our conversation today, which we’ll focus on how to navigate having three entities involved. So the physician ownership, the management group [00:03:00] ownership, and hospital ownership as well. So what does it look like when you have these three parties involved?

Mike: That’s first of all, it’s a great question.

Mike: We’ve done partnerships in many different ways. Obviously the easiest one to do is just to the two partnership model where the physician and and a management company. This allows a a larger ownership model for the physician group. However, also has involved larger financial burden on the positions are the partnership and can create a referral challenge by in the hospital, the referral patterns that seem to be less disruptive and a physician and a partnership can leverage the resources for products that may be needed for an ASC.

Mike: However, the financial gain. May not quite be as lucrative for a position when a hospital is involved, because as we see most time across the United States, hospitals are looking for a larger ownership stake, and sometimes that ownership stake can be upwards of 51%. And I’m [00:04:00] going back to the hospital and using their contracts.

Mike: Most management companies have established contracts and resources with vendors as well. It allows the partners to benefit from their negotiating expertise and helps reduce the overall capital expense of the ASC. So to circle back to your question, really a partnership is a joint venture with a hospital or two way partnership just with a position group and a management company.

Mike: They both had their pros and cons. And the only way to really make the correct recommendation is to start the conversation to best understand the current and future situation.

Erica: Sure. That makes sense. How do decisions get made though, when there are multiple ownership interests and potentially each have different priorities?

Mike: That’s another great question. So ASCs are set up with a government board. So on typical government board. You typically have an X amount of number of physicians on the board. And the reason I’m saying X is it all depends on how many physician partners are in, [00:05:00] in the in the ASC or the governing board.

Mike: You’ll have X amount of number of physicians. You’ll have one representative from a management company. And then in the case of a joint venture or a hospital, you typically would have one hospital representative as well. So then the board would then vote and agree on an operating agreement.

Mike: Will have all the rules on how an A SC will operate. And additionally, if you look at any kind of purchases that the a c will make there’s a be, there’ll be limits set up by the board, and anything that goes over the limit has to be approved by the governing board of that a SC. So decisions are made not by one or by management companies made by the group is made by the government board.

Mike: And that the governing board is there to help direct the ASC.

Erica: I gotcha. So when you’re setting up this structure with the JV and the management group, all of that, like kind of decision power is already set up in the operating agreement.

Mike: It is. It’s all designed in the operating agreement of the ASC.[00:06:00]

Mike: And again, even the operating agreement is voted on the, by the governing board as well. So all parties involved has an, have an understanding of what the operating agreement looks like and what it states.

Erica: Perfect. So when you do get to that tricky spot, hopefully it’s black and white of how you move forward because it’s already in the agreement.

Mike: Completely. You’re 100 percent correct on that.

Erica: Gotcha. So I would imagine That doesn’t always play out as perfectly as everyone would like it to. So what are the, some of the most common challenges in balancing those goals and expectations?

Mike: Yeah, we have two, two main challenges that you see in every ASC that you you develop, you manage, you build timelines and costs.

Mike: And I’ll start off with timelines to begin with, because, when you look at somebody building their investments in ASC, this is probably going to be their largest investment they’ll ever make. And they’ll make this investment one time in their lives. Most of these AACs you’re looking at investing more than, maybe a physician would pay for his house.

Mike: So you obviously want to [00:07:00] get things up and running and do it at the most reasonable price point as possible. Timelines, timelines are tricky. City and state approvals come time to take us up to three to six months just to get the approval on the construction, the design, the architecture of the building.

Mike: And when you start to do all the designs and architectural drawings, You’re already adding costs to the cost of the center before your doors even open, once we get to the construction phase of an ASC, those, that seems to go a whole lot easier for us than the initial city and state approvals construction, you can obviously see things being built, you can see walls going up, you can see movement but, in the early phases, you don’t see that movement when you’re trying to get approvals from the city.

Mike: Once the once this ASC is finally approved and finally built out we then have to go through a series of surveys and inspections to get all the licenses and get everything approved that takes time as well. Then once we finally get everything approved to get the ASC up and [00:08:00] running our next step is typically to do the first 10 cases to submit for our Medicare number.

Mike: Once you get the 10 cases done and you submit for the Medicare number you’re looking at a process that can take up to three to four months before you really get your Medicare number and that’s key to the success of an ASC with the medic, without the Medicare number, we can’t do Medicare patients and Medicare patients are a big driver in the ASC, so it’s a lengthy process and there there’s no shortcuts that you can risk.

Mike: We make up, you make one hiccup and getting all these surveys and inspections done and we get a denial from the city or the state or from CMS you’re looking at adding 3 to 6, 4 months to the timeline before that ASC can actually open. And then that’s the other part is obviously the cost.

Mike: The cost is something that, horizon solutions takes on up front so that we’re, we don’t want to have anything to stop the fart momentum of the ASC moving, a typical ASC build out can go from anywhere. So it’s from 500 to 750 per square foot. So if [00:09:00] you’re looking at a 7, 000 square foot ambulatory surgical center that build out can be 3.

Mike: 5 million plus before you add any kind of equipment into the ASC. Now this cost can be negotiated and lowered down our team here, we do a very good job of negotiating that, but it’s a big risk to the success of an ASC if you don’t, if you end up overpaying for construction, overpaying for products, overpaying for supplies the chances that, or the chances of that ASC getting the profitability in a short amount of time.

Mike: Is I would say extended because you’ve over, you overspent on the front end.

Erica: Sure. Now. Okay. So all that makes perfect sense for DeNovo or a new build. What about for an existing surgery center? That’s already up and running. What common challenges do you see there are some people always expecting growth.

Erica: Or obviously everyone always wants more [00:10:00] money, but what what issues do you see come up there?

Mike: Yeah. For an existing ASC which you typically see the issues that we’re running into is you run into staffing issues. Just to be fair, I published a paper years ago on why labs fail. And it’s interesting when you did, when you do that research through a third party company staffing was the main issue.

Mike: Of why labs fail. I’ll see the cost of this to happen. Typically represents about 26 percent of the profits just to be able to pay for your staff. And if you have a situation where you continually have a revolving door with your staff you’re continually training people, you continually trying to hire people.

Mike: It just makes, it makes the chances of that lab being profitable so much lower because just because of the staff issue. Then cost goes, it comes back to cost too. If you’re hiring staff and overpaying for your staff, obviously that’s all going down to your bottom line. And without, without having a good grasp on your staffing [00:11:00] policies and your staffing issues, you run yourself at risk of overspending for something that you really shouldn’t be overspending on.

Erica: Yeah. The staffing piece of it is. It’s so stressful right now. As I’m sure you’re seeing with your clients as well, it’s just so top of mind. So difficult to keep good staff in and hire new staff as well.

Mike: It’s hard to find. And we’re starting to see, we’re starting to see, uh, more and more travel staff and agents coming to the picture.

Mike: Which is great to have the ability to have the staff there and available. But we also know that when you hire a staffing agency, we’re paying a premium for those agency nurses and scrub techs and RTs and all. So we try to do our best to try to find local staff and fill up our labs with good quality people.

Erica: Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned the bottom line, so I want to switch gears a [00:12:00] little bit. What role does equity investment play here?

Mike: Big role, right? Everybody wants to everybody wants to join and everybody wants to be part of an ASC. It seems especially in the cardiovascular side of the world these days as well.

Mike: If you’re an equity investor in an ASC it allows for you to have a say so on how the business is being ran to keep this is key to, I would say, to keep in a successful ASC with a partnership and with the physicians. Physicians should look for what kind of equity a partner may be looking for, and I think this is key.

Mike: Sometimes you hear some people wanting sweat equity. So they’ll put in the time up front and do all the work to get all the inspections and set in the other. And then they expect a certain percentage of that equity to come back in return for the work they’ve done. And then other companies, people will come in as a capital investor and buy into the equity.

Mike: Our model is to have that capital investment. Haven’t picking the right partnership that has [00:13:00] that capital investment coming in with their services will allow the positions to lower their actual out of pocket costs to build out an A. S. C. And it goes back to the earlier questions we discussed earlier as far as ownership models in between J.

Mike: B. S. and the other having having multiple equity partners and can help. lower the cost of that A. S. C. We all have to also understand that, physicians are super busy. They don’t really have to have the hours in the day to help run that A. S. C. So having a good business partner that’s invested And the success of the ASC will allow that ASC to run a little bit more fluid and hopefully get the profitability a lot quicker.

Mike: So hopefully I answered that question. Equity being an equity owner in an ASC, having the ability to have a say so on how that business is going to be ran and having a say so on the decisions that are being made. It’s key to the success of an ASC.

Erica: Yep. So who can invest in an ASC? Cause I know we have [00:14:00] some rules and guidelines here.

Mike: Yeah. Yeah. Investing in an interventional physician or a surgeon is really easy. There is a rule, as you mentioned, called out, it’s called the one third rule. So one third of their surgical volume or interventional volume has to be done in an ASC for a physician to be a part owner of an ASC.

Mike: It’s pretty important to track all that management companies will track that and give feedback on a monthly basis in regards to volumes and who’s doing what and how that compares to their, their annual numbers. It goes back to having the right management company as well, because eventually this has happened.

Mike: Unfortunately physicians who want to invest, do not bring one third of their volume to the AFC. And then discussions have to be had or held, I’m sorry with those particular physicians to really talk to them about how to increase their volumes or potentially look at possibly moving them out of an equity [00:15:00] investor of an ASC.

Mike: Now, you can also have non interventional, non surgical partners invested in ASC. There are options. Are more based on real estate and capital equipment area. So a financial partner could come in and invest in an ASC. That could be part of the real estate package and then buy into the real estate.

Mike: The real estate is then paid back via the ASC, the rent over a period of time at a fair market value rate, very similar to what maybe a bank might loan, loan the ASC. That this and the option two would be the would be going through the capital equipment side of things where they can come in and invest in the big iron, the x ray machines and whatnot, and invest in a capital equipment side and in much like the same way as a real estate that would have a four fair market value interest rate tied into that they they’ll get there, they’ll get their money back through the interest rate.

Mike: The capital side of the business or [00:16:00] the investment seems to pay off a lot quicker than not a lot quicker than the real estate. So sometimes you see physicians wanting to do the real estate more so than doing the capital side of the business.

Erica: Yeah, that’s super interesting. So at what point does that investment come into play?

Erica: Is it? When they’re first investing into the surgery center, let’s say it is a de novo, or could it be, five years down the road if they’re looking to expand, physically expand or get new equipment for new specialties? How does that work?

Mike: The simple answer is from a real estate standpoint, it’s always up front at the beginning of the process.

Mike: So we’re identifying a piece of land we want to buy the property and, we get people that want to invest in it. You did mention five years down the road and maybe we want to expand. What we are seeing right now is. There’s a large number of office-based labs or OBLs out in the United States today, and these OBLs are wanting to move into ASCs.

Mike: A lot of these ASCs are not. A lot of these OBLs, I apologize, are [00:17:00] not built for ASC specs, so you’re having to expand or re or rebuild so you’re seeing opportunities for established. Practices to step away from their OBL to build out an ASC and use scenes opportunities to, for people to go ahead and invest in their real estate.

Erica: Very cool. Yeah. We just did a episode, maybe a month or two ago, just about all the OBLs that are coming. Into the landscape now five years ago, that was not a term I even knew. And now I feel like we’re talking about OBLs all the time.

Mike: I’ve made a career out of it again, since 2011. I presented different national conferences on OBLs and ASC.

Mike: I’m very confident that the The OVL world is, it was there and it continues to grow and, but I do see a big trend to everything switching to ASCs now.

Erica: Interesting. All right, Mike, we do this every week with our guests. What is one thing our listeners can do this [00:18:00] week to improve their surgery centers?

Mike: Three, one thing. How about if I give you three quick answers? Sure. Billet and Coden is the first one. Billing and code is the lifeline of a, of an A SC making sure that the billing and code and really the revenue cycle management, I’ll tie both of those together. So Ill just give you two answers. The billing and code and the revenue cycle management part of that of any ASC is the lifeline, the lifeblood of that a SC making sure they’re building and code is being done accurately.

Mike: And that they’re not getting a exorbitant amount of denials. And if they are getting denials, making sure that they’re being promptly followed up on so that those denials can be flipped if possible. But what I see typically. A, A one man, a SC or a two man, a SC, that may have a million dollars in denials.

Mike: That is, that’s a gut punch to that asc. You have a million dollars sitting out there and you still have payroll and whatnot. We do get [00:19:00] a lot of calls from positions, maybe not wanting to partner with us as far as investors, but want some help on this, the building and coding and the revenue cycle management to better understand why their business is struggling.

Mike: And then the second part of that answer, I would say pay our contracts. They’re difficult to get a handle on having somebody in the ASC with that kind of expertise and making sure that those payer contracts are paying what should be the fair market value of those contracts. So you got to constantly have somebody negotiating with them.

Mike: It’s a key part of our business here at Horizon Solutions. And we constantly stay on top of these big payers to make sure the payer contracts are. Set up in a fashion to where everybody can win. So without without proper billing and code and revenue cycle management, without the proper payer contracts, you’re really putting that, you’re really putting your ASC at risk.

Erica: That is great advice. Thank you so much for coming on today. We appreciate it.

Mike: Thank you. And [00:20:00] I enjoyed it. Take care.

Erica: As always, it has been a busy week in healthcare, so let’s jump right in. ASCA has officially submitted comments in response to the CMS 2025 proposed payment rule for ASCs and HOPDs. And here are the three areas they focused on. The first is the use of the hospital market basket to update ASC rates. So ASCs may see a 2.

Erica: 6 percent average updated payment rates. Combining a 3. 0 percent inflation update from the hospital market basket and a 0. 4 percent productivity reduction. ASCA successfully extended CMS’s five year trial of using the hospital market basket to update ASC rates through 2025 which would align ASC and HOPD payments.

Erica: However, rising costs like staffing supplies and anesthesia outpace this update. So [00:21:00] ASCA is advocating for continued use of the hospital market basket to better address these expenses. So hopefully they’ll approve that. I think the trial, the five year trial that they did went extremely well, at least, in our benefit.

Erica: I do think I’m hopeful that they’ll extend it. I think it’s definitely the right call especially with the trends we’re seeing with payers pushing more and more procedures to be done in an outpatient setting. It just makes sense to give us the same rates. So we will see but they are of course advocating for it to extend.

Erica: The second area of focus was the ASC covered procedures list. You might recall that CMS created a new, bear with me here, it’s called an ASC CPL pre proposed rule recommendation request process. that closed back in March. So ASCA had submitted a bunch of codes to be added. Basically, it was just an online portal in the beginning of the year that opened up where you could make those pre proposed rule [00:22:00] recommendations before the proposed rule came out.

Erica: So when the proposed rule did come out in July, CMS did not include any of the codes that ASCA had submitted back in March, but did propose to add four medical and 16 dental surgical procedures to the ASC CPL for 2025. So when ASCA’s comments that they submitted last week, they focused on the, the procedures that they had submitted back in March, which was the cardiac ablation and CPS.

Erica: Find codes citing published studies regarding the safety and success of these procedures in outpatient settings. They also criticize CMSs, lack of transparency for not publishing the list of codes submitted through that pre proposed rule recommendation request process back in March. And lastly, the third area of focus of course, the A SC Quality Reporting Program.

Erica: So CMS proposed to add three new measures. To the ASC QR [00:23:00] program. And those three measures would be. The Facility Commitment to Health Equity Measure. Honestly, this one is super confusing to me. I have read as much as I can about it. I still don’t entirely understand it. Please read Aska’s comments. And, the rule itself.

Erica: But, basically, this measure is to assess a facility’s commitment to health equity by using equity focused organizational domains. Aimed at advancing health equity for all patients in theory. I think it sounds lovely in practice. I’m confused. It’s a major word salad. But that is one of the measures that they’ve proposed this time around.

Erica: And then the second two are connected. So there is this, The second one is the screening for social drivers of health measure, which includes screening for health related, social needs of patients across five domains, food insecurity, housing instability, transportation needs, utility difficulties, and interpersonal [00:24:00] safety.

Erica: And then the third measure, which is connected to that one is basically just reporting the rates of number of patients who screened positive for those five social drivers of health that would have been found in the screening from measure number two. So ASCA did oppose these three new measures in its comments.

Erica: Their reasoning being none of them have been tested in the ASC setting and ASCA does not believe ASCs are the appropriate setting for collection of much of this information. I actually do think it’s incredibly important that ASCs are screening for these types of things.

Erica: Now whether it needs to be reported is a whole other conversation, but finding these, The social determinants or the social drivers of health are incredibly important to patient outcomes, right? If somebody doesn’t have a home to go back to, to recover, if they don’t have meals prepped for them, if they live alone and, they don’t have proper care, they just had knee surgery, they can’t get to the bathroom, [00:25:00] they can’t get to the kitchen to, to eat.

Erica: Maybe they took the bus to get to you but they need. They need a ride to get home. These are just types of things that could impact their outcomes and the safety of their recovery and the success of their surgery. So whether it needs to be reported as a whole other conversation, but I think in general, it is incredibly important that ASCs are pre screening for these types of issues During the pre assessment process.

Erica: In the summary that Karen Newberry provided through ASCA, she adds a lot more color to what I summarized here and also a bunch of additional considerations. As always, we’ll link to, we’ll link the full article in the episode notes, and I would recommend reading it in its full and, as a next step, the final rule is legally required to be released by November 2nd. It does typically come out a few days prior to that. So I will provide an update as soon as it comes out. All right. Our next [00:26:00] story is from Healthcare Dive and it’s all about California’s new data exchange framework known as DXF for short.

Erica: So the goal of the DXF is to ensure that every provider, so whether you’re at a doctor’s office, a social services agency, or an ER, every provider can access essential information about every patient that comes through. Signed into law by Governor Gavin Newsom, the DXF is the first statewide mandate to integrate health and social services data. The hope is that this framework enables secure real time information and helps to overcome kind of those outdated paper based systems that just make more and more siloed medical records.

Erica: I feel as a patient, this is something that we expect, right? You go from one doctor to the next and you’re like, can’t you just pull it up? And if you work on the back end of healthcare, you know how extremely difficult that is. No, we can’t just pull it up. But I think this [00:27:00] is Going more in the direction towards what the consumer wants and also will have tremendous benefits to patients as well and providers.

Erica: What’s unique about this is that it also wants to connect social services, so that’ll give a provider a complete view of a patient’s health and being, which would include those actual, the social determinants of health we talked about, which are crucial to delivering informed care.

Erica: What’s cool about this is that it won’t create a new technology system that everybody has to implement, or it’s not a centralized data repository. Instead, it just establishes clear guidelines for secure data exchange and requires cooperation between all parties. So thousands of health and social services entities are set to begin the exchange.

Erica: Some are still adapting and then other smaller entities have until 2026 to join. So I think this is an excellent idea and one I think a lot of people have dreamt of, but never thought it would be possible to [00:28:00] actually come to fruition. I know Massachusetts is working on a similar initiative. I believe the focus of theirs is going to be on the opioid crisis.

Erica: Instead of. Patients who are able to hop from doctor’s doctor to be able to manage their addiction. Instead, everyone will have insight to the same information and can hopefully, bring down some of the addiction rates. So similar concept, different goal.

Erica: different side of the country. But anyway, I’m super excited to see how this gets rolled out and how it all shakes out once it’s in use. All right. Third story here, according to a report by Bain and Company and Class Research, 75 percent of US healthcare providers and payers have increased their IT spending over the past year with a strong focus on cybersecurity and AI.

Erica: I’m sure you all vividly remember the high profile cyber attacks the one, like the one on Change Healthcare in February, which affected about 70 percent of the organizations that [00:29:00] were that participated in this survey. Side note on that, I actually just got my letter in the mail from Change Healthcare a few days ago that my data was compromised.

Erica: I figured I would, as most of you probably did as well, but just crazy to see the ramifications still lingering over seven months later. But, as a result of that breach, many are now investing in cyber security measures, of course, such as auditing internal systems and point protection. Endpoint protection and security training.

Erica: And on the AI front, about 15 percent of providers now have an AI strategy, which is up from just 5 percent last year. Much of this investment is aimed at clinical workflow optimization, with tools to reduce administrative tasks, generate clinical note drafts, and streamline RCM practices. So as IT spending continues to rise, the report suggests that both providers and payers are more willing to experiment with advanced tech like AI and natural language [00:30:00] processing to improve outcomes, drive ROI, save time, and combat staffing shortages.

Erica: And to end our new segment on a positive note, back in November, I shared a story about a man who received the world’s first whole eye and partial face transplant. And today I have an update for you. So Aaron James of Arkansas lost most of his face in a high voltage accident at work. The 46 year old received the world’s first whole human eye transplant.

Erica: And this week, a study revealed the clinical outcomes. While James cannot yet see through the donor eye, the study shows that it has maintained normal pressure and blood flow and retained its size. So Dr. Dadania, who is a retina specialist at NYU Langone Health, where the procedure was carried out, said the outcomes we’re seeing after this procedure are quite incredible.

Erica: The lead surgeon, Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez, said, We’ve done the [00:31:00] work to transplant an eye. We now need to do more work in understanding how to restore sight to the eye. But Aaron James, the patient, said, I’m pretty much back to being a normal guy. This has been the most transformative year of my life.

Erica: I’ve been given the gift of a second chance. I don’t take a single moment of it for granted. Of course, when I saw there was an update, I was hoping his sight had been restored. But, regardless, Aaron is extremely happy with the outcome so far, and by being so willing to try anything with his doctors, I know everything they’re learning along the way will help so many people after him.

Erica: And that officially wraps up this week’s podcast. Thank you, as always, for spending a few minutes of your week with us. Make sure to subscribe or leave a review on whichever platform you’re listening from. I hope you have a great day and we will see you again next week.