CommonSpirit Medical Group – Orthopedic Surgery – East Lexington has a robust new team of orthopedic surgeons and providers.
LEXINGTON — Anup Chattha, MD, grew up tinkering with things to fix them. Choosing orthopedics was a natural move, he says.
“I’m really good with my hands. I’ve always loved woodworking, Legos, Lincoln Logs, erector sets—stuff kids don’t play with anymore because everything’s digital these days,” he says. “Healthcare, medicine—it’s been on my radar since I was a little kid. But the orthopedic light bulb didn’t go off until my second year of medical school.”
That lightbulb was the ability to shape and mold a joint to fix a patient’s problem, he says. Being able to see almost instantly how the work he’d done had helped someone, secured orthopedics as his passion.
Chattha, with CommonSpirit Medical Group – Orthopedic Surgery, was born in New Orleans, but grew up in Michigan, where his father worked in research and development at the Ford Motor Company. His father’s drive spurred him to study more and reach further.
“My father was from Punjab in Northern India. He was the first of his family to get a higher education and go college, getting his PhD in chemistry here in the U.S.,” Chattha says. “At one point, he was second only to Henry Ford in the number of patents at Ford Motor Company.”
After earning his bachelor’s from the University of Michigan, Chattha attended medical school there. Later, he did his residency at the University of Toledo’s Medical College of Ohio and spent five years training in orthopedics.
He knew orthopedics was his passion during his second year in medical school. Listening to Larry Matthews, MD, professor emeritus of orthopedic surgery at the University of Michigan Medical School, during a lecture, he says he found his calling.
“He gave a lecture to our whole medical school class about putting two bones together; how to put in a lag screw across the bones, completely perpendicular,” Chattha says. “The engineering and physics were going off in my mind. He was talking about the satisfaction of tightening it and seeing a thin line of blood squeeze out between the bones. I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this sounds amazing!’ It took me back to the garage with my drill and putting wood together.”
That summer, Chattha did orthopedic research and worked on cadaver knees, where he compared the accuracy of MRI scans to arthroscopic evaluation when comparing how much arthritis was in them. During his third year, he saw a total knee replacement and was hooked.
“I saw how the surgeons geometrically reshaped the end of the bone and put everything in. They took a specific problem of ‘This knee is completely worn out. We’re going to replace the knee.’ And then I saw that patient back in the office a few weeks later, and they were so happy with the result. I said, ‘That’s what I’m going to do. That’s where you can actually solve a patient’s problem.’”
The Road to Lexington
It was during his third year of residency that Chattha rotated through Lexington at the Shriners Children’s Hospital. After four months living here, he and his wife fell in love with Central Kentucky and knew this was an area they wanted to come back to live in.
After his residency ended in 1999, there was an open position in Mt. Sterling at Mary Chiles Hospital. Chattha took a position as a general orthopedic surgeon. He knew the need was huge and that he could come here and make a difference.
In 2004, he set up a two-doctor orthopedic group with James Rollins, MD, that operated until 2016. Changes in healthcare left them doing more work on administration than on orthopedics, he says. While the medical practice was successful, it left less time for the two doctors to spend time on actual orthopedics.
At the same time, CommonSpirit – Kentucky, formerly CHI Saint Joseph Health, bought the hospital and built a new facility, Saint Joseph Mount Sterling. Chattha and Rollins approached the hospital about buying their practice.
“Within 24 hours, we were getting phone calls because orthopedics is a necessity both for the community and the hospital. So, we joined Saint Joseph in 2016, and have been here 10 years now,” he says.
After the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, things changed in medicine again, he says, and Saint Joseph East approached him about moving his practice to Lexington. After careful consideration and discussions with his staff, he decided to make the move to Lexington full time.
“I have had 27 years in Mount Sterling and have a loyal patient following,” he says. “But the more I thought about it, I thought, I’m 58 now. I can practice another 10 years at the pace I’m going and with the support I’ll have through the system here. The timing just made sense.”
New Orthopedic Focus at CommonSpirit Medical Group – Orthopedics – East Lexington
CommonSpirit Health, the new name for the Saint Joseph Health system, recently renovated its orthopedic suite on the refreshed CommonSpirit – Saint Joseph Medical Center – East Lexington campus with a new refurbished waiting room, expanding the number of treatment and exam rooms, and adding more space for larger staff.
It’s not just the practice space that’s expanding; earlier this summer, the team welcomed seven new surgeons and more than a dozen advanced practice providers, including specialists in hip and knee replacement, foot and ankle care, complex shoulder and elbow issues, and interventional pain management. The growing team is expanding the breadth of convenient and comprehensive orthopedic care options in the east Lexington area and surrounding communities.
“We quickly went from just one orthopedic surgeon to nine physicians and multiple physician assistants in six months,” Chattha says. Those new surgeons include Sam Coy, MD, sports medicine surgeon; David Hamilton, MD, specializing in foot and ankle surgery; Daniel Hackett, a shoulder and elbow specialist; Margaret Napolitano, MD, hand surgeon; Vincent DePalma, DO, spine surgeon; Frank Taddeo, DO, family practice sports medicine; Matthew Eads, MD, hand surgeon; and Shawn Milburn, MD, interventional pain and spine.
Chattha also relies heavily on his practice manager, Debbie Johnson, RT, CMA. “I couldn’t do this without her. We have worked together since 1999,” he says.
Still, orthopedics has changed a lot, he says. Where once surgeons would have measured mechanically and worked to replace a joint, now advances in implant design and manufacturing, new anesthesia techniques and blocks, changes in therapy protocols, and even new medications for postoperative pain have allowed surgeons to replace joints that can last decades.
“Twenty-seven years ago, when I started, we were trying to line up the implants mechanically. We would drop a bar down the tibia and kind of line it up. Say we’re pretty close, kind of dial it in, cut the bone, cement the thing in place, put the plastic in, which at that point would last eight to twelve years, and hope we had it balanced pretty well,” he says. “Now with robotics and advances in implants where it’s 3D printed titanium that requires no cement, the bone actually grows into the metal. That takes one failure point away… the durability goes from eight years to 10 years up to potentially 30 to 40 years.”
Advances in anesthesia have turned joint replacement from a major surgery to an outpatient surgery where blood loss is limited. Sodium channel blockers block pain before the patient feels it, helping them get off of narcotics in days instead of months.
“It’s advanced tremendously, and we’re always trying to stay up to date with research and on the cutting edge of technology to provide the best possible care for our patients,” Chattha says.
Biologics or Surgery
New technologies will continue to change the field, he says.
“Now that we have DNA sequencing, CRISPR, and post quantum computing coming with AI, there are going to be some real advances, not on the surgical side, I think, but on the biologic side,” he says. “I think you’re going to have medicines come out that will be able to target specific cancers and eliminate those. You’ll see it in heart disease, and you’ll see it in orthopedics as well. I think Stanford’s making some breakthroughs right now, where eventually we’ll be able to regenerate cartilage. So, if the patient’s cartilage is worn out, we don’t have to replace it with a mechanical implant. Terrible for orthopedic surgeons… but really good for patients. Pretty exciting if you can avoid total knee replacement at all and just take a pill and regrow cartilage over time.”
One thing Chattha doesn’t think will change, or should change, is the doctor-patient relationship. While advancements like artificial intelligence can tell a patient when they should get a replacement, addressing patient emotional needs is something only a doctor can do, Chattha says.
“I never tell patients this is the only way to do it. I give them the option. I let them be a partner in the decision making, and I never discourage them from getting a second or a third opinion because ultimately, it’s their body, and I want them to understand what they’re getting into,” he says.