Germany Increases Premiums for Health Insurance Through Government Plan and Looks to Cut Expenses

Back in April things were already stirring relative to to charges from hospitals and in Germany they can also opt for additional private health insurance as well as contributing to the government system. With the new increases the poor will be protected and their payments will be subsidized by the government.

Health Insurers In Germany Claiming Over Charges from Hospitals - Insurance Agents Just Happen to be the #1 Least Desired Profession

You can read at the link above though how an “insurance agent” is the bottom feeder job of all times and sadly “doctor” also makes the number 9 spot on the survey conducted in Germany. In other recent healthcare news in Germany, the move to have a PHR (personal health record) is also alive and well with Microsoft HeatlhVault.

Microsoft HealthVault and Siemens Bringing PHR Platform to Germany – And a Look at a German EHR

Last year I spent a bit of time chatting with Dr. Kunhardt from Germany, from the University of Deggenndorf and we compared notes on the cost of various surgeries here in the US and the same in Germany and actually in some procedures there was not a huge difference and when adding travel/airfare to some, it was pretty close. We also talked about medical record systems and here’s a brief summary of what we talked about. Almost everything in Germany is all electronic medical records by far.

“This is the work of Mr. Prof. Dr. Horst Kunhardt, Department of Business Informatics, University of App. Sc. Deggendorf and you can use the link here to a live demo to see how it works. I was curious having written an ambulatory EMR years ago myself just to see how it all came together. The system is created with open source software with my SQL and PHP for the demo shown. If you want to read up a bit more on German Medical Tourism, here’s a link to follow.” BD

BERLIN (AP) -- Faced with a ballooning deficit in Germany's health care system, Chancellor Angela Merkel's government decided Tuesday to raise premiums and cut into the profits of doctors, dentists, hospitals and pharmaceutical manufacturers.

The decision comes after months of wrangling within Merkel's coalition over a fundamental overhaul of the system and after a series of political blows to the chancellor and plummeting support in the polls.

While government officials said Tuesday's decision was an achievement reached harmoniously, the opposition immediately criticized the reform saying it basically consists of everybody paying more.

Health Minister Philipp Roesler said the world is still envious of the German system because of its high quality and only average cost compared to other countries.

"However, our system is facing a challenge brought on by demographic changes and progress in medical technology," he said.

The idea behind the highly complicated split-revenue system is to free employers from rising health care costs. To save the poor from being overwhelmed financially, the government is to subsidize their extra premiums if they exceed 2 percent of their income.