LAUSR

Defining the clinical complexity (CC) concept, and its consequent valid and reliable measures, has recently been considered a priority due to its important implications at different levels [1]. On the side of clinicians, the decisionmaking processes in clinically complex patients have been documented as becoming increasingly challenging [2]; from the point of view of health-care institutions, clinically complex patients have been highlighted as being in greater need of multidisciplinary efforts, increased health-care and non-health-care resources, and substantial carer and community support [1]; among educators, the CC concept has been agreed to as a core component of academic programmes aiming at preparing future generations of healthcare professionals thinking of the patient’s complexity as a whole, and not just in light of a single problem, risk, discipline, or ‘parts of the body’ [3]. In the current scientific, professional, and practical debate on CC, the work developed by Corazza and colleagues [4] is really promising: specifically, the team has developed a conceptual index which aimed at capturing the multidimensionality of the CC. Their vector model sounds innovative due to its capacity to address some of the emerging issues in the field of patient measurement: