The restructuring started positively
What was born out of necessity because the district could no longer face the huge deficits of two hospitals has now been operating since the beginning of March with the hope of better economic results. At the beginning of May, the clinic was literally invaded during its open day.
“The restructuring got off to a very positive start,” says the doctor. “The MVZ is now being received very positively by the population.” 2,000 people came from Schongau, Peiting and surrounding areas to see what his hospital had become.
Disadvantage: The “floating situation”
What this doctor says is going very well has a catch. This is the “pending situation” of this former hospital, as well as all hospitals in Bavaria and Germany. Schmidt describes the health minister’s homework in Berlin as follows: “The problem is still that the financing of our health center is not guaranteed so that we can maintain this minimum offer for the surrounding population in the long term.”
There are no clear financing commitments
Its finance chief, Deputy Director General Claus Rauschmeier, says even more clearly: “We followed this path of restructuring without clear financing commitments from the main politicians.” Schongau needs these promises and all hospitals need them immediately, says the authorized representative, who is responsible for the district council’s numbers and budget. “We urgently need signals on how these new cross-sectoral public services will be financed.” Meanwhile, other houses in Bavaria come to him and ask about the Schongau model.
In the future without intensive care
In addition to the emergency room, the first specialists set up their orthopedics, visceral surgery and radiography offices in the old hospital. An infirmary with 40 beds is maintained to monitor minor operations or geriatric patients. What no longer exists is the intensive care unit and the comprehensive care of a 24-hour hospital. The maternity ward was closed a year ago. The price of the redesign is high for the population and for the district of Weilheim-Schongau as sponsor. 200 employees had to leave the hospital. They had to move their work, and sometimes their home, to other cities.
High expenses for the district
The restructuring of both hospitals will cost the district 27 million euros this year and 14 to 15 million euros in the coming years. Some mayors only grudgingly agreed to the district budget – and with it the financial basis for the MVZ in Schongau. “We took the right path”, Claus Rauschmeier is convinced, “the atmosphere among employees has improved significantly again”. He hopes that the changes will now also be reflected in the numbers. Just that Move to 24/7 emergency room It calculates that going to an emergency clinic saves around one million euros per year. Lots of money, but still not enough to secure Schongau in the long term.
The MVZ Schongau as a model
The incentive is there. The population is increasingly accepting new offers at their former hospital, which is now called “SOGesund” (SOG is the registration number for Schongau). Only a few resident doctors criticized the fact that public money is used to finance health care that is not available to other doctors and their practices in the city. However, in the long term this will not matter at all, given the rapidly decreasing number of specialists – a third of doctors in Germany belong to the boomer generation born between 1960 and 1965.
If politicians in Berlin set the course, the basic care that the MVZ in Schongau now offers could also become a model for the decreasing number of doctors in rural Bavaria.