Nuremberg - Nuremberg is not only beautiful city, but also city in which the German medical profession can face its responsibility. “We have endeavored, together with historians, to shed light on and understand the role of doctors and the medical profession as perpetrators and victims. The truth is: During the Nazi era, doctors brought about, ordered and mercilessly administered the death and suffering of people, ”emphasized the President of the (BÄK), Frank Ulrich Montgomery, right at the beginning of his address on the occasion of the opening event for the 115th German Medical Congress today in Nuremberg.
Nuremberg was not only the city of the Nazi party rallies and the race laws, but also the city of the great trials. “One result of the Nuremberg Medical Trials is the 'Helsinki Declaration' of the World Medical Association, which in Helsinki in 1964 laid down the principles for responsible research on human beings that are recognized and respected worldwide.” Montgomery welcomed the fact that the General Assembly of the World Medical Association had commissioned the German Medical Association to carry out the revision of this declaration.
The BÄK -President found words of praise for the federal government's health policy. Federal Health Minister Daniel Bahr and his predecessor (both FDP) had created financial security for an entire legislative period. The question, however, is how to deal with the surpluses in the statutory health insurance (GKV). Among other things, Montgomery suggests leaving the surpluses in the statutory health insurance.
At the same time, he advocates abolishing the practice fee. "It only costs bureaucracy and it burdens the patient-doctor relationship" Bahr shares this view. A personal contribution, which has become nuisance for patients and doctors, can be dispensed with. The Supply Structure Act also found approval at Montgomery. “This law is more than just country doctor law; it is classic repair law. ”
The amendment to the licensing regulations also met with approval. “A compulsory tertial in general medicine, as requested by the Health Committee of the Federal Council, was shot from the hip,” criticized Montgomery. The Federal Medical Association was then "successfully" active: "The plenary session of the Federal Council has rejected compulsory term in general medicine."
A broad theme of the opening event was "Freedom". Like health, they are often taken for granted, emphasized the liberal health minister. Those who want to improve health cannot play off personal responsibility and solidarity against each other. Personal responsibility is the prerequisite for solidarity.
Montgomery considers the freedom of medical decisions on medical issues to be fundamental freedom for patients: "Without this freedom of medical decision-making, there can be no true patient rights." it is “extremely dangerous” to make doctors vicarious agents or agents of health insurance funds, because this would force them into the conflict between the interests of the patient and the insurance company in all cost-effective decisions. "That would be the death of all free medicine."
The BÄK President also sees the freedom of the health insurance system in danger. He considers both private (PKV) and statutory health insurance to be important. "If private health insurance didn't exist, we would already have much leaner range of benefits in the statutory health insurance." However, this would arise immediately “if patients and doctors were dictated in standard insurance policy how the medicine of the future should look.
That is why Montgomery considers the citizens' insurance, which some politicians are considering, to be nothing more than "turbo charger" for two-tier medicine. And in this he has an ally in Bahr. He, too, is of the opinion that both private health insurance and statutory health insurance have their advantages. “Anyone who wants single fund fails to recognize that this makes the patient supplicant. Patients would then be deprived of any freedom of choice, for example if they were not satisfied with certain services of the only existing health insurance company.
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Bahr called it future task "to work out, strengthen and develop the advantages of both systems instead of believing that single system is the answer to demographic change . " The private health insurance (PKV) would have already built up retirement provisions. Bahr warned against "eating these reserves for breakfast now."
Finally, Montgomery criticized the implementation provisions of the Genetic Diagnostics Act. He even described it as prime example from the "theater of the absurd". Out of an honorable intention, grotesque retraining programs emerged, "qualification marathon without sense or understanding and worst of all: devaluation of the self-governed value of further training".
The supply structure law described Montgomery as "classic repair law". The Vice President of the German Medical Association and President of the Bavarian State Medical Association, Max Kaplan, also discussed the Supply Structure Act in detail: “We have to take advantage of the opportunities this law offers us and implement it constructively. He sees opportunities in the new requirements planning, in cross-sector care in networking and in the creation of new cooperative care structures. "It is law for patients because it guarantees their care," said Bahr.
In conclusion, the minister once again spoke out in favor of the decision-making solution with regard to the amendment to the Transplantation Act. In contrast to the contradiction solution, "which relies on the laziness of the people", it is clever way.