On Nov. 3, Father Michael Rozier, S.J., Ph.D., visited Creighton University to discuss his new book, “Growing our Moral Imagination: Approaching Health Care with a New Faith-Based Vision.” Chapters consider health policy, mental health, addiction, global health and more.
According to his university profile, Rozier is an associate professor of healthcare administration and Vice Provost for Strategic Initiatives at Loyola University Chicago. His research focuses on how moral rhetoric functions in health policy and the ethics of population health and health technology.
Tying back to his book’s title, Rozier started his talk by admitting his life took an unexpected turn. Neither he, nor his family, ever imagined him joining the Jesuits, introducing the topic for his talk: imagination.
His book specifically centers on the power of moral imagination, which he summarized as “the capacity to consider the world as it could be, with specific concern for elevating goodness.”
Regarding U.S. healthcare’s capacity for moral imagination, Rozier focused on four main points evaluated throughout his book: access, cost, quality and equity.
Rozier identified healthcare access as wanting to obtain life-saving treatment for everyone. Healthcare is only accessible for certain groups, leaving 28 million Americans without coverage. Additionally, preventative care is limited, which leads to end of care access, leaving people in inhumane conditions until it is too late.
Cost is important for ensuring patients have a good return on their investment. In the U.S., Rozier pointed out, Americans spend 18% of GDP on healthcare, more than any other industrialized country. Rozier encouraged conversations about a system that prioritizes healthcare rather than treating it as a free market.
Quality is measured through outcomes in comparison to cost. A lot of people in the U.S. are able to get very good care for specific things, but the results compared to the exorbitant amounts Americans pay does not equate. For example, Rozier spotlighted how Americans’ life expectancy is less than Canadians’ and the U.S. has double the maternal mortality rate compared to Canada, even though Americans do not have universal healthcare.
Rozier explained that factors such as zip code and credit score can predict life expectancy. Improving equity requires reducing the influence of social class on health status, ensuring equal clinical care and better distributing social resources.
Sophomore College of Arts and Sciences student Isabella Colon Alba attended Rozier’s talk.
“It helped me understand that policy shifts aren’t going to change the healthcare system; it needs to be a complete paradigm change for people to receive the healthcare they deserve,” Colon Alba said.
Rozier encourages college students to go beyond technical components in classes by taking a step back and asking why their learning matters and how it can be applied.
By being in a community of practice and discussion with one another and gaining support from the right people, students can develop imaginative ways to understand how the world can unfold in a previously unforeseen way. Rozier includes discussion questions at the end of his book to engage these conversations with people who have different answers to fundamental questions.
Ultimately, the book promotes values-based discourse surrounding prominent healthcare issues. Rozier helps readers expand their imaginations by showing we should care for everyone and treat them all as our neighbors, just as the Good Samaritan does.
Rozier invites healthcare professionals to feel optimistic about change, fostering an imaginative audacity concerning where the system could go. He acknowledges reform will not happen overnight, but meaningful discourse and changing the moral framework leads everyone to dare to imagine a better outcome for all involved in the system.