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I recently attended a vascular symposium sponsored by the Western Vascular Institute in Galway, Ireland. The overall quality of the meeting, chaired by Mr. Sharif Sultan, a vascular surgeon and senior lecturer at the University College Hospital of Galway, was excellent. However, the most enlightening part of the meeting was a session devoted to examining how Ireland supports its "ecosystem" for growth by nurturing small businesses in health-related fields. Needless to say, I was also intrigued by their emphasis on developing new treatments for vascular diseases.

Like the United States and most of the world, Ireland is in the throes of a serious economic downturn. Jobs are disappearing and unemployment is dangerously high. The pain from this is felt throughout the country. However, the Irish clearly recognize that a major solution to this problem and an engine for job creation is an organized national effort to develop small and large businesses in the health care field.

They also appreciate that although recent scientific and clinical advances provide a huge opportunity, they can be successfully exploited only if all segments of the Irish community band together in a structured way to support their development.

United by a common goal, the Irish have managed to dovetail the interests of segments of society as diverse as governmental agencies, regulatory bodies, engineering and scientific academia, the banking system, health and hospital administrators, clinicians at many levels, and business interests both large and small.

What seems unique about the Irish is that they recognize the importance of pursuing this unified initiative as a path out of their country's economic quagmire, which was brought on by the collapse of its housing market and banking system. The Irish people realize that small and large businesses need to be nurtured and supported by all of society to create jobs and help start their nation's economy on the road to recovery.

And most important of all, they are willing to work together toward this goal. This means fostering cooperation among enlightened and supportive academic and clinical communities, favorable tax policies, an industry-friendly credit and banking system and Irish Medicines Board, the drug-and-device regulatory agency analogous to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Once devices are approved and "CE marked" by this agency (the CE marking certifies that a product has met European Union consumer safety and health or environmental requirements), they can be marketed freely anywhere within the EU.

The Irish government also has established a National Policy and Advisory Board for Enterprise, Trade, Technology and Innovation to coordinate this business effort and to help make sure that clinical trials can be conducted rapidly and efficiently when appropriate. Finally, Ireland has a young and talented workforce that is well-educated in scientific, engineering, and managerial skills and eager to meet the challenge of developing small and large businesses.

Leaders of all these constituencies-- all parts of the puzzle-- share in the belief that small businesses are of critical importance to the economic recovery of the country. All of these sectors have chosen to work together so that the optimal environment exists, thereby ensuring the best possible chance for business success.

This constitutes the Irish "small business ecosystem" that will help bring small businesses to bloom faster and more efficiently than elsewhere. This same business-supportive ecosystem will also make it easier and more efficient for larger health care companies to bring their developmental work and clinical trials to Ireland rather than to other countries where some or all of the regulatory and clinical elements are poorly organized, more bureaucratic, or frankly obstructive.

Mr. Sultan is himself an example of this approach. He founded the Irish company Embricon in February 2005 in conjunction with a team of bioengineers, scientists, and financial consultants.

Embricon is classified by Enterprise Ireland as a "high performance start-up company," which is focused on the research, development, and the commercialization of innovative endovascular solutions. The company is located at the Business Innovation Centre at the National University of Ireland, Galway.

Why is this important to Americans? Our country and particularly our government should take a lesson from the Irish and recognize the importance of what is happening there. Health care reform may be needed.

But in our zeal to cut costs and provide affordable health care to all, no one should lose sight of the economic opportunity that is offered to us if we as a country and our government can come together in an organized way to facilitate the development of small businesses in the health care field, as the Irish are doing.

Because these businesses represent 17% of our gross domestic product, they can become a major engine for pulling us out of our economic slump.

Ireland is a small country with limited natural resources, but it has devised a way to harness its industriousness and ingenuity to recover from its economic perils without sacrificing its national identity.

However, with all of the relentless talk about our health care "reform" and the changes that are being considered in our tax structure, I am apprehensive these will snuff out the fragile green shoots of small businesses in general and in the health care field in particular.

If that happens, the United States will fall behind the rest of the world in innovation. A strong engine for job creation and economic recovery will be turned off. More jobs will go overseas to more enlightened and better organized countries, and we as a country will pay a bitter price.

Our country should never let that happen.