Organizing for sustainable healthcare

Healthcare, as it is currently organized, is not sustainable. Healthcare systems in the developed world are encountering increased demand for high quality healthcare but facing societal resource limits. Healthcare managers, professionals and academics worldwide are debating how to redesign its current organizational configurations and delivery paradigms to deliver more with less, amidst profound changes in demographics, increased cost of new technology and changing healthcare priorities. Healthcare is inextricably linked to the overall sustainability of society and it is critical that solutions are found. The chapters in this volume examine healthcare systems that are building the foundations for sustainable, high quality healthcare. Case-based analyses discuss substantive organizing changes aimed at operating within resource limitations, while taking advantage of new knowledge and medical advances that could have an unprecedented positive impact on the health of individuals and societies. The volume also explores the change capabilities and learning mechanisms that healthcare systems need in order to implement fundamental change and continue to improve over time.