It’s funny how, as we’re growing up, we don’t really notice it: our bodies constantly evolving. Subtle changes stacking to become not-so-subtle ones. Somehow, we can always look in the mirror and recognize the person staring back. Cities can be like this, too. The way familiar places get redeveloped to accommodate growth. Same as how our skeletons regenerate every 10 years, you don’t notice it until you do—until you take a couple steps away from the mirror or travel an old familiar road.
Our biology is driven by change, by growth. Does it not make sense, then, for our health care to grow and change along with us? For the communities in which we live to flourish? Their people looked after as best we know how?
Of course, systematic transformation is never easy, nor is it fast. It’s a boulder sitting atop a hill until someone finally decides to give it a shove. Which is where our donors come in. They’re the ones taking the first step, shouldering the weight to get the big rock moving, gaining momentum as more people see the benefits of boulder removal and join in to help clear the way for innovation.
One push buys state-of-the-art equipment. Another push funds a clinical trial. One push gives more access to treatment. And another makes a breakthrough discovery.
Change = vision × capacity. Newton’s Second Law, I think it is.
But as amazing as it is to see, it doesn’t stop with just one boulder. Behind it lies another one, heavier than the first. Then another and another and two more behind that, irregularly shaped and difficult to unwedge from each other.
To keep evolving with our health means always asking, What’s next? It means stepping back and looking at the bigger picture because closeness doesn’t always promise clarity. So, maybe it’s not the boulders that are the issue, but rather, the hill itself.
And what does the shape of rocks have to do with the future of health care? Probably nothing. What I do know is when we work together to push beyond what we think is possible, we’re no longer constrained by boundaries—we break them.
Yours,
John H. MacFarlane, BBA, LL.B, MPA
President & CEO
London Health Sciences Foundation
Yours,
John H. MacFarlane, BBA, LL.B, MPA
President & CEO
London Health Sciences Foundation