Federal Health Minister Nina Warken (CDU) aims to reduce the number of cases treated in hospital emergency rooms and save over one billion euros in the long term. This emerges from a draft law by Warken, which the Augsburger Allgemeine newspaper reported on Wednesday. According to the draft, the emergency care reform is expected to result in 1.2 million fewer patients being treated in emergency rooms per year.
Emergency rooms currently provide acute care for approximately 13 million cases annually. "The goal is to ensure a nationally uniform and equivalent emergency care system for all those seeking help," the draft law states. Hospitals across Germany have been complaining for years that their emergency departments are overloaded.
Warken plans to provide relief through a three-step approach. According to the legislative text, the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians will be required to continuously provide video consultations and house calls, even in acute cases. Additionally, hospitals are to form so-called integrated emergency centers with emergency medical practices.
"In the integrated emergency centers, licensed hospitals and the Associations of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians work together in a binding manner to ensure that adequate outpatient primary medical care is always available," the draft states. The goal is to treat more patients there and send them home without admitting them to the hospital. Doctors working in these centers should be authorized to prescribe medications for acute needs.
Emergency rooms are to be relieved in the third step through better remuneration for ambulance drivers and paramedics. Currently, emergency services are only compensated for transport to the hospital (travel costs), which results in an often "unnecessary use of rescue resources and emergency rooms."
In the future, they should care for those seeking help on-site and, if necessary, refer them to a medical practice. For this purpose, the Health Minister plans to introduce a new benefit in kind that health insurance funds must cover.
The bottom line is that money should be saved. According to the legislative text, the reform will save over 200 million euros next year, and 650 million euros by 2028. By 2030, according to calculations, savings will reach 1.1 billion euros.
Inpatient treatment in hospitals is the most expensive. Warken recently presented her reform ideas to break the dynamic of rapidly rising costs. Hospitals, practicing physicians, the pharmaceutical industry, and also members of statutory health insurance funds are all expected to contribute to keeping the healthcare system affordable. The cabinet is scheduled to approve the reform at the end of April.
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