Our On-Site Endoscopy Center in Fort Smith

Our endoscopy center is a dedicated procedure suite inside the Fort Smith clinic at 3416 Old Greenwood Rd, where Dr. Herraka performs colonoscopies and upper endoscopies. It shares a building with the clinic and Southside Specialty Pharmacy, so a visit, a procedure and a prescription are one trip.

What is the endoscopy center at Digestive & Liver Center of Arkansas?

Our endoscopy center is a dedicated procedure suite inside our Fort Smith clinic, where Dr. Ihab Herraka performs colonoscopies, upper endoscopies, and other digestive procedures. It is located at our Main Clinic, 3416 Old Greenwood Rd, Fort Smith, AR 72903, the same building where you see your doctor for office visits. That matters more than it sounds. You are not referred out to a hospital across town, handed to a doctor you have never met, or put on someone else's waiting list. The physician who takes your history is the physician who performs your procedure and gives you your results. The suite includes procedure rooms with monitoring equipment, a private recovery area staffed by nurses, and a scope reprocessing area that follows national infection-control standards.

Procedures performed in our endoscopy suite

Most of the digestive procedures our patients need are done right here, including:

• Screening and diagnostic colonoscopy, including removal of polyps
• Upper endoscopy (EGD) with biopsies when needed
• Balloon dilation of a narrowed esophagus, done through the scope during the same sedation
• Capsule endoscopy, a swallowed camera that photographs the small intestine
• Evaluation of rectal bleeding, anemia, chronic diarrhea, and swallowing problems
• Hemorrhoid banding, a brief office procedure that needs no sedation or fasting If a condition needs hospital-level care or a specialized service we do not offer, Dr. Herraka arranges that referral and stays involved in your care.

Faster scheduling, closer to home

Having our own suite means we control the schedule. Hospital outpatient departments juggle surgeries, emergencies, and multiple specialties, and a routine screening colonoscopy often waits behind all of it. Here, procedure time is set aside for our patients only. For most healthy adults, that means you can call, have a nurse review your health history by phone, and get a date, with no separate office visit first. Patients travel to us from Fort Smith, Van Buren, Greenwood, Alma, Barling, and Charleston, and from Poteau, Sallisaw, and other communities in eastern Oklahoma, and we try hard to keep that drive to a single trip.

Why an office-based suite often costs less

The same procedure can carry very different charges depending on where it is performed. Hospital outpatient departments typically add a facility fee that office-based endoscopy suites like ours do not, so for many patients the total cost of a colonoscopy or upper endoscopy here is lower than the same procedure at a hospital. Published research on ambulatory surgery centers has found facility fees running roughly 50 to 60% lower than a comparable hospital outpatient department, and a large Medicare study of more than 174,000 patients found no difference in colonoscopy complication rates between the two settings. What you personally pay still depends on your insurance plan, your deductible, and whether the procedure is billed as screening or diagnostic. We never guess at that. Our staff verifies your benefits before your procedure date and explains what your plan says.

Your care team, including sedation

You are cared for by a small, consistent team: Dr. Herraka, procedure and recovery nurses, technicians who assist during the exam, and an anesthesia professional (often a certified registered nurse anesthetist, or CRNA) whose only responsibility is your sedation and your comfort. Dr. Herraka is board-certified in Gastroenterology, Internal Medicine, and Obesity Medicine, completed his Internal Medicine residency and Gastroenterology fellowship at the University of Florida, and has been in practice since 2012. He founded this Fort Smith practice in 2016. He speaks English and Arabic. Because sedation is handled by a dedicated professional, Dr. Herraka can focus entirely on a careful, unhurried exam, which is exactly what finding small polyps requires.

Safety and monitoring

Your vital signs are monitored continuously from the moment sedation begins until you are awake and ready to leave. That includes heart rate and rhythm, blood pressure, and blood oxygen level, watched by staff at your side rather than from another room. For most patients, sedation for endoscopy is not general anesthesia. You breathe on your own the entire time. Emergency medicines, oxygen, and airway equipment are kept in every procedure room, and our team trains for the rare situations that call for them. Every scope is cleaned and disinfected between patients according to manufacturer instructions and national reprocessing guidelines, and that process is documented. Single-use items, such as needles, biopsy forceps, and syringes, are used once and discarded.

What to bring on the day of your procedure

Keep it simple. Bring:

• Photo ID and your insurance card
• A current list of all medicines, vitamins, and supplements, with doses
• Your completed paperwork, if you were sent forms ahead of time
• Your CPAP information if you use one for sleep apnea
• A responsible adult driver
• Comfortable, loose clothing Leave jewelry and valuables at home. Follow your fasting instructions exactly, and take only the morning medicines we told you to take, with a small sip of water.

Who drives you home

You must have a responsible adult drive you home. This is not negotiable, and it is not about our policy. Sedation affects your reflexes, memory, and judgment for the rest of the day, even when you feel fine. A rideshare or taxi alone is not enough for most sedated procedures, because someone needs to receive your discharge instructions and stay with you afterward. Your driver should plan to be in the building, or reachable and nearby, for the length of your visit. If you truly cannot arrange a driver, call us before your procedure date rather than on the morning of it, and we will help you figure something out.

Cost & insurance

Procedures in our endoscopy center are covered by most major plans, including Medicare and both Arkansas and Oklahoma Medicaid; the full list is on our insurance page. Self-pay pricing is available for elective services. How much you owe depends mainly on whether your procedure is billed as screening or diagnostic. A screening colonoscopy in an average-risk adult with no symptoms is usually covered as preventive care by most plans. A procedure done because of symptoms, or on a shorter surveillance schedule, is billed under your regular medical benefits, so your deductible and coinsurance may apply. Our insurance page has more detail, and our billing staff will verify your benefits and answer questions before your date.

Schedule your procedure in Fort Smith

To schedule a colonoscopy, an upper endoscopy, or an office consultation, call Digestive & Liver Center of Arkansas at (479) 242-2888. Our Main Clinic and endoscopy center are at 3416 Old Greenwood Rd, Fort Smith, AR 72903, open Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.