Even as the U.S. begins implementation of one of the most comprehensive healthcare policies ever passed, Regina Herzlinger, a leading researcher and long-time advocate of consumer-driven healthcare, argues that policy cannot fix the broken healthcare system.

The United States has come to a fork in the road regarding its spending on health care – it can choose a route of fewer benefits and less affordability, or choose a route of making the system work better and more efficiently.

Delivering more health care value requires a focus — from policymakers, health care providers and consumers themselves — on the whole person and episode of care rather than on the treatment.