COMMUNITIES COLLABORATING

Theory and models are important as we seek to make meaning of the events we have experienced in contemporary health care. It is only after we have made meaning of experiences that we are able to trace out their implications. Furthermore, while we can use theory to bridge the gap between our own experience and interpretation of our experience and the experiences and interpretation of experiences found in the perspectives of other people, it is through the use of case studies that we can learn (vicariously) most directly from the experiences of other people. Numbers can help us determine if a specific procedure has been successful; however, to discover WHY a specific procedure has been successful usually requires the intense study of specific experiences in the use of this procedure. In this section of the Salus Forum, we turn to case studies that have been offered by our colleagues in the Salus Forum who hasve been serving in a leadership role in specific health care systems... Diverse..