German health minister Prof. Lauterbach announces the “overcoming of the DRG system”

"We have gone too far with the DRG system," declares Federal Health Minister Lauterbach at the opening of the German Hospital Day at Medica. He speaks of "overcoming the DRG system" and "replacing the DRGs" and states that "Vorhalteleistungen" will take on a completely different meaning. Concrete details are not mentioned, "that was again only a headline [...]" judges the president of the Association of Hospital Directors of Germany (VKD), Josef Düllings.

Now is the time for a fundamental hospital reform Lauterbach said. In addition to the topic of digitization, this is one of the priorities that the Minister of Health wants to set during this legislative period. The topics of budget stability of "pediatrics," changed financing of "obstetrics" tied to structural specifications, "daycase  treatments" in hospitals and "hybrid DRGs" are only the most important topics that need to be solved quickly, but are not yet part of the actual big reform. The representatives of self-government were not satisfied overall, calling for "quality assurance of the legislation" (Düllings) and were handing out poor school grades ("clearly in need of improvement," "inadequate," "major deficits in collaboration," "transfer to next class at risk").

Healthcare Heads' assessment: "For us, the G-DRG system is primarily a measurement tool that has been expanded and refined to high precision in Germany. For us, it remains unclear even after this event whether "only" the financing of hospitals is to be reconsidered and new incentives are to be set via modified frameworks, or whether the entire principle of calculation and transparent Reimbursement is to be abolished. We regard the latter as a retrograde development and not suitable for tackling the major challenges of the current era in a targeted manner."

E-Mail: info@healthcareheads.com

Phone: +49 431 800 147 0