In these strange and unnerving times, when it is becoming increasingly difficult to predict anything, we have persuaded a few brave souls to gaze into their crystal balls and provide some glimpses of the possible future of health care. And, while recognising that evidence-based health policy is generally regarded as oxymoronic, we have some interesting research that might be helpful in underpinning developments in policy and practice in the future.
One of the major impediments to the development of smooth and efficient patient pathways within the NHS, and to the establishment of truly integrated, clinically effective, and cost-containing care, is the continuing professional and organisational divide between general practice and hospital medicine. Daniel Lasserson, who has the first chair of ambulatory care in the UK, at the University of Birmingham, describes how ‘interface medicine’ will become a new and important aspect …