The ‘Lucerne Initiative for Functioning Health and Well-being’ (LIFE) is seeking to improve health and well-being in the face of disease, injury and ageing. To achieve this, it is raising awareness of the concept of ‘functioning’ developed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as a new way of understanding health in society and rooting it as an indicator of health. A conference on this is taking place this week at the University of Lucerne.