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A national physician network and management services organization serving veterans with chronic disc-related back pain

Affiliate Network Sites

A program of Veterans Spine Network

A service line for the veterans you already have

Open a procedure to your existing census that you cannot offer today, because there is no authorization pathway behind it. VSN supplies that pathway.

How the Network Works

From a patient you already have to a completed case

Nine steps from identifying a candidate in your own census to your compensation clearing. At each one, this page states which party carries it — because the split of responsibility is fixed, and your clinical practice stays entirely yours.

Become an Affiliate Site Scope of Participation

The lifecycle

Where the service line stops today, and what opens it

Steps two through four are the ones a practice cannot build on its own. They are also the reason a clinically appropriate case never reaches a procedure day.

  1. 1

    You identify a candidate in your own census

    Affiliate

    A veteran already in your practice presents with chronic disc-related back or neck pain, has completed or failed conservative management, and is enrolled in or eligible for VA health care. Your census is yours, and building it remains your own work and expense — the network does not supply patients.

  2. 2

    The patient enters VSN intake

    Affiliate → VSN

    With the patient's consent, the case transfers into network intake. This is the step that makes the service line available: without it, the case has nowhere to go.

  3. 3

    Authorization

    VSN

    VSN operates the authorization pathway and tracks the authorization through to the procedure. Eligibility for care in the community is determined by VA — not by VSN and not by the affiliate.

  4. 4

    Intake, records, and coordination

    VSN

    Centralized intake, records and imaging collection, and patient coordination through the episode — so your front desk is not absorbing the administrative load of every case.

  5. 5

    Forecast and scheduling

    Affiliate → VSN

    The affiliate provides a rolling thirty-day forecast of confirmed, scheduled cases and reserves dedicated procedure days against it. VSN provides scheduling support and patient preparation.

  6. 6

    Evaluation and candidacy

    Affiliate

    Your physician evaluates the patient and determines candidacy from the diagnostic findings. That determination is the treating physician's alone. Candidacy criteria are set by VSN as a condition of participation, but the clinical judgment is not overridden.

  7. 7

    Procedure day

    Affiliate

    Your physician performs the case in your licensed procedure suite, with your credentialed support staff and procedure kits built to VSN specification, following VSN clinical protocol and documentation standard. Where the practice does not have a physician trained in the Intradiscal Stabilization Procedure (ISP℠), VSN provides one.

  8. 8

    Billing, follow-up, and outcome registry

    VSN

    Claim submission, denials and appeals, and collections are handled centrally. VSN follow-up intervals remain with VSN — that is where the outcome registry is built, and it is not delegated to the site.

  9. 9

    Compensation

    VSN → Affiliate

    The affiliate is compensated per spinal level treated, as documented by the treating physician in the procedure record. The rate is all-inclusive. Cases with no treated level generate no compensation.

The split, fixed

Who carries what

This does not flex by site. It is the same arrangement for every affiliate in the network.

The affiliate carries

  • • A treating physician trained in the procedure — or VSN provides one where the practice has none
  • • Licensed procedure suite, to the state's standard for the setting
  • • Documentation of licensure, accreditation, and survey status
  • • Dedicated procedure days for network cases
  • • Credentialed clinical support staff
  • • Procedure kits produced to VSN specification
  • • Your own patient census and the work of building it

VSN carries

  • • Payer relationship and authorization pathway
  • • Authorization tracking through to the procedure
  • • Clinical protocol, candidacy criteria, documentation standard
  • • Centralized intake, records collection, and coordination
  • • Administrative and billing infrastructure
  • • Outcome registry and long-term patient follow-up
  • • A trained treating physician, where the practice does not have one

Patient volume is not on either list, because it is not something the network delivers. VSN does not route patients to affiliate sites — the service line is for the veterans already in your practice.

Standards

State governs the room. VSN governs the medicine. You practice it.

This distinction is load-bearing and it does not blur.

Facility standards — your state’s

The applicable facility standard is the standard set by the state in which the site operates, for the setting in which the procedure is performed. VSN does not set facility standards and does not substitute its judgment for state requirements. The standard travels with the site, not the network.

The affiliate carries the burden of proof and delivers source documentation before the first case, maintained current through the term. VSN receives and verifies; it does not inspect and approve.

Clinical standards — VSN’s

Set by VSN, conditions of network participation, and not subject to modification at the site level:

  • • VSN clinical protocol, in full
  • • VSN kit specification
  • • VSN documentation standard
  • • VSN follow-up intervals
  • • VSN candidacy criteria — the determination itself is made solely by the treating physician
Become an Affiliate Site What VSN provides