An integrated delivery system (IDS) is a network of health care

Health care

Health care is the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in humans. Health care is delivered by practitioners in medicine, chiropractic, dentistry, nursing, pharmacy, allied health, and other care providers...

 organizations under a parent holding company. Some IDS have an HMO

Health maintenance organization

A health maintenance organization is an organization that provides managed care for health insurance contracts in the United States as a liaison with health care providers...

 component, while others are a network of physicians only, or of physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

s and hospital

Hospital

A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment by specialized staff and equipment. Hospitals often, but not always, provide for inpatient care or longer-term patient stays....

s. Thus, the term is used broadly to define an organization that provides a continuum of health care services. There is some discussion over the efficiency and sustainability of IDS. Integrated delivery systems are one example of the emergence of managed care

Managed care

...intended to reduce unnecessary health care costs through a variety of mechanisms, including: economic incentives for physicians and patients to select less costly forms of care; programs for reviewing the medical necessity of specific services; increased beneficiary cost sharing; controls on...

organizations in the United States.