Keynote address – the outrage cure: responding to loss, betrayal and hopelessness in healthcare

Something has changed in our clinics, our teams, and our waiting rooms. Patients arrive angrier. Colleagues are exhausted, cynical, or quietly disengaging. The usual responses — wellness programs, communications plans, another engagement survey — aren’t working, because they treat the wrong condition.

Anger is a call for help. Outrage is what happens when no one answers. When outrage goes unanswered for long enough, it collapses into the most damaging state of all: indifference. Patients, clinicians and clinic teams  have not left, but they have stopped believing change is possible.

Based on his national bestseller The Outrage Cure, Dr. Alika Lafontaine — the first Indigenous president of the Canadian Medical Association and a practicing anesthesiologist in northern Alberta — offers a hopeful, practical guide to the emotional reality of practicing medicine right now. He traces how loss, betrayal and hopelessness carry us through anger, outrage and indifference, why suppressing those emotions makes everything worse, and why burnout is what indifference looks like when people get stuck and change feels impossible. 

He’ll also show the way back: hearing anger as a signal rather than noise, answering calls for help before they harden, and rebuilding the human connections that thriving health systems have always depended on. Along the way he’ll examine how digital health is amplifying every stage of this journey — and what questions we should be asking of every new tool. 

Participants will leave with a simple diagnostic — where do my patients, my team, and I sit? — and concrete actions matched to each emotion. Rooted in real stories from the front lines of care and his own national leadership, this keynote offers clinicians things in short supply: an acknowledgement that the heaviness you’ve been feeling is real, a reason to believe a better tomorrow is possible, and the map to get started. 

Learning Objectives 

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Distinguish between anger, outrage and indifference, and identify where their patients, teams and practices sit along that emotional continuum.
• Tailor their response to the emotion in front of them, addressing underlying concerns and rebuilding connection rather than dismissing or suppressing them.
• Assess whether a digital health tool is likely to strengthen trust or undermine it before integrating it into practice.
• Apply practical strategies to rebuild trust, strengthen engagement and foster healthier clinical relationships and team dynamics

Presented by:

• Alika Lafontaine, MD, Indigenous Advisor-in-Residence, Canadian Medical Association, Rural Anesthesiologist, and the author of The Outrage Cure

Presenter Bios:

Alika Lafontaine, MD

Named Maclean’s top Health Care Innovator of 2023, Dr. Alika Lafontaine is among the most influential voices in Canadian medicine today. A seasoned anesthesiologist and transformative leader, he made history as the first Indigenous and youngest physician to serve as President of the Canadian Medical Association—an institution more than 150 years old. His bold, visionary leadership continues to shape how Canadians think about healthcare, equity, and the future of our public systems.

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