Don't forget the patients

"But equally important is the reality that physician behaviour drives most other health-system costs: Doctors write the prescriptions, order the tests, and admit patients to hospitals – or keep them well in the community."

Yes, but who are the doctors writing prescriptions and ordering tests for?  Patients. 

Patients have to run the gauntlet, trying multiple access points to find the right service; more often than we'd like to admit, the wrong solutions are found, exacerbating the underlying problem.

The first step in addressing our health care woes is to better understand patient motivations and how patients interact with the system.  That means, through overcoming the mental health stigma to determine and accommodate the root cause of patient behaviour.