title: Synergy-COPD: a systems approach for understanding and managing chronic diseases.
abstract: Chronic diseases (CD) are generating a dramatic societal burden worldwide that is expected to persist over the next decades. The challenges posed by the epidemics of CD have triggered a novel health paradigm with major consequences on the traditional concept of disease and with a profound impact on key aspects of healthcare systems. We hypothesized that the development of a systems approach to understand CD together with the generation of an ecosystem to transfer the acquired knowledge into the novel healthcare scenario may contribute to a cost-effective enhancement of health outcomes. To this end, we designed the Synergy-COPD project wherein the heterogeneity of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) was addressed as a use case representative of CD. The current manuscript describes main features of the project design and the strategies put in place for its development, as well the expected outcomes during the project life-span. Moreover, the manuscript serves as introductory and unifying chapter of the different papers associated to the Supplement describing the characteristics, tools and the objectives of Synergy-COPD.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Gomez-Cabrero
authors.forename: Magi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lluch-Ariet
authors.forename: Jesper
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tegnér
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cascante
authors.forename: Felip
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Miralles
authors.forename: Josep
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Roca
mesh_terms: D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000628:therapy; D015897:Comorbidity; D003198:Computer Simulation; D020000:Decision Support Systems, Clinical; D003695:Delivery of Health Care; D057286:Electronic Health Records; D006801:Humans; D017146:Models, Organizational; D018482:Muscle, Skeletal / Q000503:physiopathology; D016730:Program Development; D029424:Pulmonary Disease, Chronic Obstructive / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000628:therapy*; D017216:Telemedicine / Q000379:methods