An article written based on the work of the Project Promoting Implementation of Recommendations on Policy, Information and Data for Rare Diseases - RD-ACTION reviews the main literature available on the integration of health services and links it to rare diseases. It identifies several system levers for the effective design and implementation of integrated care frameworks, namely: political support and commitment, governance, stakeholder engagement, organisational change, leadership, collaboration and trust, workforce education and training, patient empowerment, financing and incentives, information and communications technology infrastructure and solutions, monitoring and evaluation system. This article is based on one of the policy briefs developed during RD-Action.