European Network on Psychosomatic Medicine (ENPM)

The ENPM: history and future directions

Hans-Christian Deter, Kristina Orth-Gomér, Bohdan Wasilewski and Ramiro Verissimo

The ENPM is a discussion forum

To coordinate all strength in the Psychosomatic/Behavioural field to make common actions according healthcare facilities in the European  countries, especially - on an European level - in primary care and specialties. A sufficient infrastructure in a EU healthcare system will be triggered by European Guidelines in different somatic diseases. This important tool has to be discussed under psychosomatic aspects, moreover ENPM initiatives and coordinates actions for common research funding in the European Union.

The ENPM is interdisciplinary

What means that all professions working or doing research in the medical field can take part without preferences for any profession: medical doctors in primary care, all kind of specialists in psychiatry, internal medicine, gynaecology, dermatology, etc; psychologists, sociologists, nurses and other professions.

The ENPM is integrative

The scope of clinical work and research is the whole medical field and all sub-disciplines. What means that psychosomatic medicine is dedicated to the bio-psychosocial aspects of medicine, including cognitions, emotions, behaviour and physiology.

Rational discourse and scientific evidence are the basis

But hermeneutic methodology and other methodological inputs are accepted, if it is necessary to understand human complexity and human beings.