Prescription for Excellence: How Innovation is Saving Canada's Health Care System

K.V. Nagarajan is a professor in the Department of Economics at
Laurentian University.

“It is tragic,” writes Michael Rachlis, “that the health care
system currently wastes so much human potential. But the good side of
all this waste is that it provides a bank of resources from which to
fund innovation.” According to Rachlis, emergency rooms need not
overflow with unattended patients in the hallways. Dying patients need
not suffer uncontrolled pain. Long-term-care facilities need not be
warehouses for old people. Waiting lists can be whittled down. The list
of refutations goes on. Is he dreaming in technicolour? It turns out
that he is doing no such thing.

In this book, the Toronto-based physician and health policy analyst
dismisses both the right-wing call for more private health care and the
left-wing call for more money for health care. The former is dangerous
and expensive, and the latter is unnecessary.

The answer, Rachlis believes, lies in innovation. He has assembled
impressive examples of innovations in every field of health care. Much
of the innovation he describes is of an organizational nature, not
requiring more money or hardware. While the media focus on all the
horror stories, he focuses on the success stories from not only Canada
but also the United States, the United Kingdom, Britain, New Zealand,
and Australia.

While Prescription for Excellence gives much hope, it does not fully
address some critical issues, such as physician maldistribution and
pharmaceutical development and safety. The author’s emphasis on
prevention and socio-economic determinants of health is on target, but
it is not clear who will be responsible for developing policies that
take these factors into account. Furthermore, while the book is very
good in delineating the role of health-care providers and
administrators, it is not so clear about what our politicians are
supposed to do other than bicker and quarrel over money and
jurisdiction. Perhaps they could start by reading this well-written,
eye-opening book.