Beginning of the infection and vaccination season in practices: “The supply crisis has long been there, but where is the politics?”
25.09.2023 15:36
In its press conference on September 20th on the occasion of General Practitioners' Day, the General Practitioners Association sounded the alarm and warned of gaps in care that could no longer be closed in the future. Dr. Markus Beier, Federal Chairman of the Association of General Practitioners, and Prof. Dr. Nicola Buhlinger-Göpfarth, first deputy federal chairwoman, warns with regard to the current situation: “At the beginning of autumn, our waiting rooms are filling up again with people wanting to be vaccinated and cases of infection. It used to be a home game, but today more and more practices are forced to turn away new patients who are not an emergency.
Given that there will soon be 5,000 unfilled family doctor positions and a proportion of family doctors over 60 years old of over 35 percent, politicians should have been panicking and initiating one measure after the other. Instead, our practices are even waiting for the implementation of reforms that were decided years ago. What else needs to happen for something to change? The state of emergency has long been here, but where is the politics?”
With a view to the increasingly tense situation in many practices, Prof. Dr. Buhlinger-Göpfarth: “Last winter was already a foretaste: the supply is on the verge of collapse and will only be compensated for by our willingness to keep doing extra shifts. However, many practices are no longer able to compensate for the failures of politics through long, exhausting working days, retirement from the age of 70 and less and less time for more and more patient contacts and, together with their exhausted practice teams, will at some point no longer be able to withstand the pressure to provide care. This will only further aggravate the situation. There is a risk of a chain reaction, the consequences of which on patient care politicians should not risk at any price.”
The promised de-budgeting of family doctor services is a long time coming
“This year, our delegates will once again decide on very clear recommendations for action that respond to the reality in our practices. Politicians would do well to finally open their eyes and implement the necessary measures - starting with those they have already committed to. “It is completely incomprehensible why our colleagues in regions such as Hamburg or Berlin are still having to work unpaid extra shifts, especially in these challenging times, because the promised de-budgeting of family doctor services is still a long time coming,” said Dr. Beier. “The same applies to the urgently needed strengthening of general medicine at universities. Almost seven years ago, the reform of medical studies, which was intended to ensure that more students get to know our profession, was decided. If it had been implemented directly, the first alumni who would have benefited from the changes would begin their further training in our practices next year. Instead, we are still waiting while practices in many regions are desperately looking for successors. Good approaches are simply not enough; If there are problems with implementation, we won't be any better off in the end. Politicians now have the chance to turn things around – but there is not much time left.”