What Matters When Everything Matters: A Call for Collective Action
When it comes to healthcare, everything matters. Yet healthcare leaders and providers are forced to make tough decisions daily on how to use their limited resources. We have seen this manifest as Emergency Departments shutdowns, reductions of panel size, and waitlists… So. Many. Waitlists.
The system designed to keep Canadians healthy is under immense strain to address acute crises. To its credit, we are actually relatively good at meeting these urgent needs. However, by mobilizing our resources to tackle problems one at a time we lurch from crisis to crisis and often fail to address the systemic upstream causes. This lack of upstream action is not a knowledge gap but rather an HHR bandwidth and funding issue. For instance, we know children and youth today are waiting on average 9 months to 2.5 years for mental health services. This is a challenging but not insurmountable problem, yet I worry this may be one of the many next acute crises on the horizon.
So how can an organization, or even a sector, effectively prioritize what matters amidst this sea of critical issues. The truth is: they can't. They can’t because everything matters, yet they are forced to choose none-the-less. When tackling a no-win situation, we must change the rules. We need to expand how we define our health system: social services, education, and housing are often just as critical as healthcare services when it comes to well-being of Canadians. Perhaps even build in new governance structures, or at the very least create new lines of communication and data sharing. Any ministry funded frontline serving agencies have skin in the game and must work together to meet Canadians where they’re at, and collaborate, coordinate, and cooperate to improve their health outcomes. By embracing the truth that no sector or organization can do it alone, we can change the rules, and hopefully the outcomes.
This means that a non-negotiable competency for organizational leaders will be authentic partnership and engagement expertise. Our shared vision and joint mission can be our north star. By pooling our expertise, resources, and insights, we amplify our capacity to effect meaningful change. We need to move beyond silos, and beyond organizational ego. Mission, not organizations must frame our approach and inspire our activities. We need to convene systems, not just organizations with a single sector, ensuring indigenous voices, equity-deserving voices, and the voices of patients and families are held as equal to executive leaders. This shift challenges us to view the health system as an interconnected and multi-ministry ecosystem, where the health of one organization profoundly influences the well-being of the entire system.
By collectively identifying needs, by collaboratively delivering solutions, and through courageous coordination not competition, we can unite the fractured health landscape and proactively provide the care that Canadians deserve. As we stand at the intersection of challenges and opportunities, let us commit to collective action. The only way to prioritize what matters is to prioritize everything. This may be an ambitious call to action but we do not lack for brilliant staff, great ideas, nor effective administration - we lack funding, long-term provincial and federal vision, and human resources protected to do this work.
We can do hard things, but the only way to do hard things is: Together.
