Cash patients wait longer for medical appointments

In Brandenburg, insured persons on average wait 24 days longer for an appointment with the specialist

09/09/2013

Brandenburg's cash patients have to wait an average of 24 days longer for an appointment with a specialist than privately insured persons. This resulted in a survey on behalf of the National Association of Alliance 90 / The Greens. „We are in the middle of two-class medicine“, commented Annalena Baerbock, national leader of the Greens, the result of the survey.

Cash patients sometimes do not even get a doctor's appointment in Brandenburg
For the survey, 250 specialist practices in Brandenburg were called twice. Once was asked for an appointment as a cash patient and once as privately insured, with the supposed complaints were identical. As it turned out, legally insured persons in Brandenburg have to wait an average of 24 days longer for an appointment with a specialist than private patients. Cash patients in Cottbus and the southeastern districts of Brandenburg, who have to wait an average of 33 days for a specialist visit, are particularly hard hit. As the Greens report, over 100-day waiting periods are also not uncommon. The top spot was occupied by an ophthalmologist from Eberswalde. The cash-patient had to expect 180 days, the privately insured only 18 days.

Who in Cottbus, Spremberg, Lübben / Luebbenau, Wildau, Herzberg or Peitz need an appointment with the dermatologist or ophthalmologist, have particularly bad cards. In the survey, 17 out of 21 practices had not given an appointment to cash-desk patients. As a private insured in the same practices at least after two to four weeks waiting time have received an appointment, said the national association of the party.

„In many places, appointments are not based on the symptoms, but on the type of insurance, due to the different fees“, explains Baerbock. The Greens therefore advocate citizens' insurance, in which all people and types of income are to be included. „One of the steps on the way to becoming a citizen's insurance company is to set a common fee for doctors - for the same benefit, there will be the same amount of money, no matter which insurer pays the fee. This increases the incentives to favor certain groups. "Other parties, such as the Left Party and the SPD, are in favor of introducing citizens' insurance to counter two-class medicine.

Picture: Aka