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20 Euro Doctor Admission Penalty for unnecessary emergency ambulance patients?
Emergency rooms in hospitals are actually only intended for emergencies. But more and more patients, who could also be treated on an outpatient basis, go to these clinics. Experts had therefore proposed a possible emergency admission fee of 20 euros. Others reject this punishment.
Many patients are wrong in the emergency department
Every year, up to 25 million people are treated in hospital emergency rooms. However, it has been repeatedly criticized for years that too many wrong patients come, for example, because of colds or other trifles. In some clinics the emergency rooms are completely overcrowded.
Since emergency departments in hospitals often burst at the seams, experts have proposed an emergency room. Physicians are against such fines. (Image: Robert Kneschke / fotolia.com) Every third patient could be treated on an outpatient basis
According to specialist associations, one-third of patients could safely be treated in the private sector, so they do not belong in the hospital, "the association of alternative health insurance companies recently criticized in a statement. To address the problem, experts had proposed an emergency room fee of 20 euros. But many do not think so.
No fines for patients
For example, Thuringia's physicians refuse to pay fines for patients who go to hospital emergency rooms without good reason, the news agency dpa reports. "This is not an issue at all," said the chairman of the Kassenärztliche Vereinigung (KV), Annette Rommel, to the German Press Agency. In her opinion, the idea of asking for "false" emergency patients is not only completely paradoxical but politically unenforceable.
20 Euro emergency room fee proposed
The Kassenärztliche Vereinigung (KV) Berlin had proposed an emergency admission fee in the discussion about the onslaught of patients on the emergency ambulance clinics. Everyone who comes to the emergency room should therefore pay a flat rate of 20 euros. If it's an emergency, he gets his money back, not otherwise.
Hospitals have to justify emergencies
In Thuringia, on the other hand, the KV relies on so-called portal practices, which precede the hospital emergency rooms. There it is decided whether the patients need acute treatment or can wait until the regular consultation of medical practices.
As the agency message says, they had begun negotiations with the state hospital company, health insurance funds and individual clinics. In addition, Thuringian clinics must now justify whether they are actually emergencies. If they do not do this, they will not receive their benefits. (Ad)