Psychiatric diseases already have a great impact with regard to personal and social impairment and socioeconomic costs. The burden of psychiatric diseases on societies is even expected to grow in the years to come. The WHO for example predicts that Major Depression will be the disease with the most disability-adjusted-life-years (DALY's) by the year 2030 in the industrially developed countries.

New approaches and concepts for the treatment of psychiatric illnesses are therefore needed in research and in care.

A critical point will be the establishment of timely, goal-orientated and scientifically founded therapeutic interventions (e.g. according to national or international treatment guidelines) in psychiatric diseases. Such an improvement of the structures of psychiatric care is to be expected by the new models of integrative care.

The “Integrated care of depression” has been established in the Aachen region in 2006 as a model for a best-practice cooperation of inpatient and outpatient care. The aims of this network are the early detection of depression, the optimization of the treatment, the prophylaxis of relapses and especially the improvement of the transitions between the medical practitioners, other therapists and the hospitals involved.

An improvement of the care of psychiatric diseases will be one major step in the quest to prepare the society for the burden of psychiatric diseases to come in the near future.