This study examines the role of clinicians during supply chain disruptions and the impact of these disruptions on their capacity to deliver care to patients. Clinician leaders (physicians, nurses, pharmacists and regional health authority leaders) from seven Canadian provinces (Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec and Manitoba) participated in co-design sessions to identify strategies to integrate frontline clinical expertise into supply chain management.

This paper describes a framework that engages diverse leaders and decision-makers across Canada's federal, provincial and territorial jurisdictions to build collaboration that overcomes the silos and competition among jurisdictions during healthcare supply disruptions. The collaboration model proposes to address the challenge of fragmented and competitive approaches among Canadian jurisdictions to source and manage supply shortages, which increases the risk of harm for both patients and the healthcare workforce.

Canada’s health systems remain vulnerable to supply disruptions due to over reliance on globally sourced health products and limited visibility into domestic manufacturing capacity. This study presents an empirically tested, artificial intelligence enabled search platform designed to automate the sourcing of health products from Canadian companies. The platform enables supply chain teams to efficiently identify Canadian suppliers for health products, overcoming the lack of aware- ness of Canadian manufacturers of health products and builds a “Canada First” supply chain strategy. The platform has the potential to identify Canadian suppliers, reduce the burden of manual searches, support jurisdictions seeking to diversify Canadian sources and prioritize economic growth.

Canada's healthcare supply chain faces persistent disruptions, and its fragility has been well documented. This jeopardizes patients' access to critical care and places significant stress on healthcare professionals, which points to the essential need for a collaborative approach to building relationships, strengthening self-reliance and advancing healthcare supply chain resilience in Canada. This paper documents the design and development of a community of practice (CoP) strategy, bringing together representatives from different sectors, including the private sector, government, health workforce, health system leadership and citizens, to successfully mobilize their diverse expertise and co-design practical solutions to support supply chain resilience in Canada.