The Research Network on Chronicity, Primary Care and Health Promotion (RICAPPS) is born

• Three groups from the Aragón Health Research Institute have joined this initiative, which is holding its first face-to-face meeting these days in Menorca.

Primary Care is the most frequent and accessible contact of the population and is responsible for the care and monitoring of patients with chronic diseases, so implementing strategies and protocols with an integrated, longitudinal and person-centered approach is necessary to guarantee the sustainability of the systems. To respond to this challenge, the Research Network on Chronicity, Primary Care and Health Promotion (RICAPPS) has been created, whose general objective is to promote network research at the national level oriented towards health results in primary care, chronicity and health promotion. The purpose is to transfer the results to clinical practice and health service organizations and thus guarantee the improvement of health care for the population.

Subsidized by the call of the RICORS Subprogram (Research Networks Oriented to Health Results), within the Strategic Action in Health 2021 of the Carlos III Health Institute, this Network is made up of 26 research groups and 9 associated clinical groups, located in 12 autonomous communities, among which are three belonging to the Aragón Health Research Institute (IIS Aragón): Aragonese Primary Care Research Group, led by Rosa Magallón; Health Policy and Services Research Group, whose main researcher is Enrique Bernal; and Group EpiChron of Research in Chronic Diseases, headed by Alexandra Prados. All of them are attending these days the first face-to-face meeting of the Network, which is held in Menorca.

Its scientific program, with a holistic approach, is structured into five objectives that include fourteen work packages. One of the network's priorities is to promote collaborative work, the transfer of knowledge and the possibility of sharing experience, resources and information between different groups. To do this, the groups will have the collaboration of professionals and specialists from primary care, prevention, public health, epidemiology, mathematics, statistics, economic evaluation, pharmacology, psychology, sociology, anthropology and other specialties.

The purpose is to guarantee a high-quality methodological approach, adapted to the context of Primary Care and adjusted to the dynamic challenges and advances that are emerging in the health system. This approach aims for more comprehensive care that includes health promotion, improved prevention, diagnosis and treatment, and specialized care for chronic diseases.

Chronic diseases are the main causes of mortality in Europe and Spain. Furthermore, they require complex, integrated and coordinated long-term health care, involving different health professionals, resources (medications, diagnostic tests, surgery, rehabilitation, nursing care) and, sometimes, coordination with social services. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and organizations such as Canadian Task Force, US Preventive Services Task Force, the Spanish PAPPS and multiple scientific societies, the majority of these diseases can be prevented by implementing health promotion and disease prevention strategies, which would allow patients to maintain their quality of life at acceptable levels, also optimizing resource consumption. sanitary. To do this, knowledge about the best strategies to provide a solution must be improved and catalyze the real application of the knowledge generated by research in daily practice.