Internal and emergency medicine
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Integrated care (IC) is a term now commonly adopted across the world, which implies a positive attitude towards addressing fragmentation of service provision inside health systems. While the principles of IC are simple, their implementation is more controversial. The ever growing number of IC definitions is related to the increasing domains of applications, which reflect the increasing demand induced by ageing multi-morbid patients. ⋯ Another historically rooted reason of IC weakness is the occupational status of European general practitioners (GPs). While single large-scale organizations have become a pressing priority for a modern primary care, most GPs are still selfemployed professionals working in their own cabinets. It is time to reconsider the anachronistic status of GPs so as to enhance IC in the future.