Is it mandatory insurance? Insurance doesn't make everything affordable, but it probably wild have been helpful. Though maybe the co-pay would have been $50k.
Universal tax-payer funded insurance? The term "tax payer" is interesting because politicians and pundits forget that we're all tax payers in one form or another. Granted some pay more, some are net consumers of govt services. But tax payers mean us, and those with more earned income more than those with less. I think the main difference between taxes and donation is choice.
Single-payer or government provided healthcare? Pretty sure that no one would identify the government as the picture perfect example of efficiency. Plus, putting elected officials or their appointees in charge of handing out goods and services doesnt seem to be sustainable. Not that putting profit seeking entities in charge has yielded the ideal result.
Making drug providers, healthcare providers and everyone else in that supply chain non-profit? Profit has enormous motivational powers. Not always for good. But it is pretty amazing what can be accomplished by organizations setup to create wealth.
Big Data? Sorry, I couldn't resist. Well, lets use that as a proxy for innovation. It would seem that greater opportunity for innovation would help. Lower barriers to trying new drugs, procedures, diet, treatments would allow for potentially lower cost solutions to be created.
Separating health care from your job? Of your insurer only needs you to be healthy until you find a new job, there's not much in incentive for long-term healthcare and preventative screenings to identify tumors and other problems before they become an expensive problem. Though that would seem to be an arguement in favor of a single payer system.
Sorry, I don't have an answer. Hopefully, great stories like the OP continue. But if we don't make it scale then we haven't really done all we possibly can do.