Eva von Vietinghoff-Scheel, head of the municipal company in the district of Würzburg (KU), which maintains the Main Clinic in Ochsenfurt in Lower Franconia, is skeptical about the key issues paper by the Ministry of Health on hospital reform. You don’t know what exactly the clinic is going to do – especially with regard to the performance groups that are to be introduced and in which areas you may have to restructure. There is a lack of specific guidelines. Eva von Vietinghoff-Scheel said in an interview with BR24 that one would wait carefully and observe the legislative process very closely.
Ochsenfurt location important for the region
According to the original plans of Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD), the Ochsenfurt Main Clinic would probably fall into Level 1, which is solely intended to ensure the basic care of patients. The clinic has 140 beds in various specialist departments such as abdominal surgery, urology and gastroenterology. It is unclear whether certain departments can continue to exist in the future, according to the head of the municipal company.
“I don’t see the location being endangered,” says Eva von Vietinghoff-Scheel and warns: “What we absolutely must avoid is that services are taken away from us or offers that are so important for the patients who are with us are canceled.” Many people who live south of Ochsenfurt would also rely on the clinic: “I always say that the world doesn’t end behind Ochsenfurt.” A patient from the Ore Mountains was only recently admitted to the Ochsenfurt emergency room because all the other clinics were full, she adds.
Cutting beds as a solution to staffing problems?
In general, Eva von Vietinghoff-Scheel criticizes the fact that the Federal Minister of Health assumes that the personnel problem can be solved by cutting beds and departments or by closing individual houses. This does not lead to better healthcare for patients. On the contrary: Doctors would no longer come to hospitals if certain specialist areas were eliminated.
University Hospital Würzburg: Reduce bureaucracy
In the Würzburg University Clinic, which is almost 30 kilometers away, they want to wait and see how the further legislative procedure is designed. “An important point from our point of view, however, is that it really doesn’t lead to more bureaucracy, that this documentation effort for the clinics is really reduced in order to get more space and time for the actual task, namely patient care,” says clinic spokesman Stefan Dreising Conversation with BR24.
Relief of the emergency rooms through reform?
Those responsible at the Würzburg University Hospital hope above all that the reform will be carried out in a well-planned manner. In general, one welcomes the financing of the clinics to 60 percent through so-called provision services, which are to be paid solely for the technology and staff available. This will relieve the emergency rooms in particular, according to the clinic spokesman.
Furthermore, as part of the reform, networking with the smaller district clinics, such as the Main Clinic in Ochsenfurt or the Main-Spessart Clinic in Lohr, is to be expanded. Doctors from the Würzburg University Clinic are already helping out in certain cases in the smaller hospitals or providing advice. Investments are to be made here in the future, especially in the field of telemedicine, in order to ensure health care in rural areas at least from afar.
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