THE GAME PLAN DIFFERENTIAL 

Photo by Unai Huizi (via Canva)

“March Madness: A hallucinatory disease with symptoms that resemble the effects of doing heroin and LSD simultaneously; often mistaken to be related to the NCAA basketball tournament.” —Alex Mirman, Urban Dictionary

A SANE LESSON IN MARCH MADNESS

“There was a time when Urban Dictionary felt essential,” writes Julia Carpenter in the New York Times. However, this may not be the case today. Carpenter goes on to say, “For the first time in 20 years, and only the 12th time since 1898, Merriam-Webster added more than 5,000 new words [in 2025]. ‘Rizz,’ ‘doomscroll’ and ‘dumbphone’ made the cut . . .” Yet the captivating annual college-basketball tournament known as “March Madness” didn’t!

Although I’m not an avid tournament fan, I do like watching the coaches kneeling on the floor drawing game plans in the middle of a team huddle. I often wonder what those plans entail. Most of the time they aren’t completely visible to the TV audience, but they likely include clear objectives and effective methods for achieving them. By the end of the game, the team with the best game plan usually wins.

GAME PLANS BEYOND THE BASKETBALL COURT

While we frequently see game plans in sports, they are also used by businesses, organizations, and individuals in order to improve the odds of success in their endeavors. Like a strategic plan, game plans clarify an objective, identify effective methods for achieving it, and define levels of success. A good game plan can be key to achieving favorable results and serves as a differentiator.

If game plans are essential in sports, business, and other enterprises, what role do they play in the operations of the healthcare industry?

WHEN THE GAME PLAN IS PROFITABILITY 

Game plans in sports are created by coaches, but in the health-systems industry, they are usually formulated by executives. Like watching coaches drawing game plans on the court, seeing how often health-industry leaders’ strategic plans focus on profitability is interesting, to say the least. Instead of enhancing patient well-being, health executives have prioritized AI, digital health experiences for consumers, and technology as their strategy for achieving profitability in 2026. This profitability derives from delivering more revenue-generating medical treatment—a trend evidenced by data documenting increases in the annual number of services delivered to patients over the last three years. 

Unfortunately treating symptoms and illness does not resolve common imbalances in body and mind, such as problems resulting from insufficient consumption of nutrient-rich foods or from an inability to manage positive and negative emotions. These imbalances contribute to the development of most if not all health problems.

In addition, patients are mostly unaware of the negative impact these common imbalances make because they are not typically acknowledged by healthcare providers. Consequently, medical treatment appears to be the only available resource for addressing their health problems.

If healthcare providers raised patient awareness about the value of adopting a personal strategy for improving mind and body balance, it is possible that their patients would enjoy greater levels of healthiness and personal well-being.

MAKING A GAME PLAN FOR HEALTHINESS 

My neighbor Randy was excited to learn that standing on one foot while brushing his teeth would improve his balance. Meanwhile, my office mate Christie was happy to discover that nopal cactus could prevent diabetes. Although I enjoyed their enthusiasm, I had to concede that the leg exercise wouldn’t create the balance and agility Randy desired and the nopal cactus supplement couldn’t substitute for eating more nutrient-rich foods. Sure, health-miracle ads and infomercials are enticing, but even taking a multitude of their products or following their suggestions doesn’t replace the need for a systematic approach to health-building. Just as in sports and business, following a good health-building game plan is key for success.

Merriam-Webster defines a game plan as “a method worked out in advance for achieving some objective.” The objective of healthiness is to attain a harmonious state of being. This desirable state occurs when all aspects of the human mind and body work together as a balanced cohesive whole.

Such a game plan’s methods hinge on creating the conditions that bring more healthiness. This includes placing equal interest in healthiness as in medical treatment, incorporating effective health-building practices in daily routines, and using simple ways to measure and track results, such as having more capacity to function in life, less illness, and less need for health treatments.

Since we’re not likely to find support for creating healthiness in our healthcare industry at this time, we’ll need to find other coaches and leaders to help us strategize and achieve favorable results.

Fortunately, helping people create and implement effective healthiness-building strategies is a primary objective of our game plan at Advanced Wellness Systems. If you or your company want a robust and radical approach for solving modern, health-related challenges, contact us and find out more.

Joyce M. Young, MD, MPH 
Managing Director, Advanced Wellness Systems
Lead Expert for the High Health Network

 Photo by benjaminjk Getty Images (via Canva)