Multimorbidity care model: recommendations from the consensus meeting of the Joint Action on Chronic Diseases and Promoting Healthy Ageing across the Life Cycle (JA-CHRODIS).

Patients with multimorbidity have complex health needs but, due to the current traditional disease-oriented approach, they face a highly fragmented form of care that leads to inefficient, ineffective, andpossibly harmful clinical interventions. There is limited evidence on available integrated and multidi-mensional care pathways for multimorbid patients. An expert consensus meeting was held to develop aframework for care of multimorbid patients that can be applied across Europe, within a project fundedby the European Union; the Joint Action on Chronic Diseases and Promoting Healthy Ageing across theLife Cycle (JA-CHRODIS). The experts included a diverse group representing care providers and patients,and included general practitioners, family medicine physicians, neurologists, geriatricians, internists,cardiologists, endocrinologists, diabetologists, epidemiologists, psychologists, and representatives frompatient organizations. Sixteen components across five domains were identified (Delivery of Care; DecisionSupport; Self Management Support; Information Systems and Technology; and Social and CommunityResources). The description and aim of each component are described in these guidelines, along with asummary of key characteristics and relevance to multimorbid patients. Due to the lack of evidence-basedrecommendations specific to multimorbid patients, this care model needs to be assessed and validatedin different European settings to examine specifically how multimorbid patients will benefit from thiscare model, and whether certain components have more importance than others