The head of the panel doctors, Andreas Gassen, advocates a fee for patients who come to the emergency room in the future without a prior initial telephone assessment. “Anyone who continues to go directly to the emergency room without first calling the control center may have to pay an emergency fee, because that costs the solidarity community more money and ties up medical resources unnecessarily,” Gassen told the editorial network Germany (RND).
It is always argued that such fees are anti-social. “In my opinion, however, it is antisocial to use the emergency service inappropriately and thus endanger the lives of other people,” emphasized the head of the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KBV). He added: “Anyone who can still go to an emergency room themselves is often not a real medical emergency.”
At the same time, Gassen welcomed the plans of Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD) to virtually connect the rescue service on 112 and the medical on-call service on 116117 in order to make an initial assessment and then guide the caller correctly.
Lauterbach rejects the idea for an emergency room fee
Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach rejects the idea of an emergency room fee. There are currently intensive consultations on the restructuring of emergency care in Germany, said the SPD politician on Wednesday in Berlin. A fee is not discussed. “Therefore, the proposal that Mr Gassen put forward here by the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians will not be implemented.”
Green: ER fee is misleading and dangerous
The Greens health politician Janosch Dahmen rejected the proposal for an emergency room fee under certain conditions as “misleading and dangerous”. “People with an acute medical problem must be able to rely on the fact that they will be helped in the emergency room at any time, regardless of their wallet,” said Dahmen of the German Press Agency in Berlin.
In many places, people with simple medical problems are already unable to find an appointment in a doctor’s office for weeks. “The currently incomplete basic care, especially that of general practitioners, means that some medical problems become emergencies in the first place.” Instead of making suggestions to the clinics for fines in the emergency room, care by general practitioners and paediatricians should be strengthened and offers such as round-the-clock home visit services and telemedical emergency treatment by the panel doctors should be expanded.
Patient Protection Foundation is subject to a penalty fee
The German Foundation for Patient Protection rejects a penalty fee for emergency room visits without a prior initial telephone assessment. The corresponding demand by the head of the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians, Andreas Gassen, is unjustified, said the board of directors Eugen Brysch. “Because there can be no question of mass abuse of the emergency rooms. After all, almost every second person would turn to the medical on-call service for non-life-threatening complaints.”
Patients are often unable to interpret the severity of their symptoms. It is also often difficult for physicians to make a non-specialist diagnosis. “That’s why the associations of panel doctors have to do their homework first,” Brysch demanded. In addition to the expansion and specialization of the medical on-call service, this also applies to adequate opening times for the established medical practices and the offer of home visits.
