title: Political issues in internal medicine in Europe. A position paper.
abstract: What will be the future of internal medicine in Europe? Because of rapidly growing concerns regarding the position of internal medicine in many European countries, the European Federation of Internal Medicine (EFIM) has established a working group to analyze the situation. Being well aware of the variation in working practices in the different countries, the members of the group used an "all-European" approach to answer the following questions: Internal medicine is the modern, clinical, and scientific medical discipline that is responsible for the care of adult patients with one or more complex, acute, or chronic illnesses. Internal medicine is the cornerstone of an integrated health care delivery service that is needed today. Decision-makers in politics and hospitals, insurers, journalists, and the general public need a better understanding of what internal medicine can offer to the health care system and to the individual patient.
authors.forename: Werner
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Bauer
authors.forename: Petra-Maria
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Schumm-Draeger
authors.forename: Johannes
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Koebberling
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Gjoerup
authors.forename: Jose Javier
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Garcia Alegria
authors.forename: Faustino
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Ferreira
authors.forename: Clare
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Higgens
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kramer
authors.forename: Giuseppe
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Licata
authors.forename: Moshe
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mittelman
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: O'hare
authors.forename: Serhat
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Unal