Applying WHOlistic Healthcare Locally

Healthcare is a vital human need. Often unrecognized is that like politics all healthcare is (or at least it should be) local. In 2010 the U.S. Congress passed a sweeping reform of America’s healthcare system. This was another piecemeal rearrangement of America’s existing delivery-centered model. U.S. healthcare is unfortunately an enigma. 1) Changes in delivery do not necessarily equate to improved health. 2) Cost will rise as long as entrenched definitions (not just interests) remain in place. 3) Because of collective intelligence the answers are not hidden, yet real barriers remain including language ones.

This project will experimentally apply definitions developed by our earlier Health and Healthcare Examiner Team beginning in a geographic area of 120,000 people in Atlanta-metro Coweta County, Georgia. This team is recruiting both a wide geographical and professionally diverse member base. So don’t hesitate to a) check us out or b) investigate starting up a parallel effort in your local area.

The title of this project emphasizes one of fifteen new or improved definitions. This ‘made-to-stick-better’ definition, WHOlistic incorporates an exceptional sixty year old WHO characterization.

WHOlistic Definition: (hõõ•liś•tik, or W•H•O•liś•tik) To transform the health of the whole person; to blossom physically, emotionally, mentally, socially and spiritually; a person’s state of health as exemplified by the World Health Organization (WHO) definition of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.

The application of this baseline definition locally and the accompanying definitions is a demonstration project. It is also an opening sortie toward shifting the U.S. national debate by reframing America’s Health in a way that all competing parties and interests can more equally embrace. The original Project Team - A Redefinition of Health and Healthcare - will simultaneously make itself over, yet retain its considerably broader focus.

Background:

1) This Project is part of the third of four stages – Implementation - in the Open4Definition process (see Resources >> Whitepapers and The Open4Definition Universal Process for further explanation).

2) In Resources>>Case Studies see The Health and Healthcare Definition Team Report for even more insight and detail. Pages 12 and 13 of 16 further describe WHOlistic and why this stipulative definition has the most transformative potential among the fifteen developed over our year of examination and analysis.

3) Under Projects also see A Redefinition of Health and Healthcare plus A HealthCARING America.