Doctors urgently needed – that is the motto for the Austrian Health Insurance Fund (ÖGK) in the next few weeks and months. A separate website has been activated for this purpose since Tuesday (meineeigenepraxis.at) to inform interested parties. The goal: 100 additional statutory health insurance physicians should be found in this way, exactly the number that the government promised for this year in the spring.
Nobody believes that it will work out this year. But they are “very confident” that the 100 cash register positions can be filled in the next few months, assured Moritz Mitterer, chairman of the ÖGK general meeting, yesterday. ÖGK chairman Andreas Huss also assured: “We will do everything we can to fill these 100 positions as quickly as possible.”
Image: VOLKER WEIHBOLD
According to the ÖGK, around 300 checkout positions are currently unoccupied in Austria and the search is difficult. It is not uncommon for well-paid specialist positions to be advertised in metropolitan areas – and yet there is not a single application for them.
100,000 euro injection
As part of the health care reform, 50 million euros are now to flow into this “Plus 100” initiative. Among other things, the aim is to motivate those interested in hard-to-fill positions in the fields of general medicine, pediatrics and gynecology to set up or take over a practice with a starter bonus of 100,000 euros.
The new doctors should be divided according to a key system according to federal states and specialty. To put things into perspective: In Upper Austria alone, it was found in the spring that around 90 checkout points in the country were unoccupied.
ÖGK chairman Huss is satisfied with the financial equalization and the associated health reform measures – but with limitations: “It is positive that there are additional funds for the expansion of the private practice area. However, we have not been granted the funds to the extent that we actually need “, says Huss. In order to introduce a uniform Austria-wide overall contract and modern flat-rate remuneration for statutory health insurance doctors, “more money is urgently needed”. In an interview with OÖNachrichten in the summer, Huss estimated that the ÖGK would need around 240 million euros more annually to fill hundreds of cash register positions.
PVE as key
For the ÖGK chairman it is also clear that the future of practicing doctors lies in the so-called primary care units (PVE). The PVE are the key, especially in metropolitan areas. “In ten years we won’t even have to discuss this anymore,” says Huss.
There are currently around 50 PVEs in Austria, and ten more will be implemented from the beginning of 2024, which means there will soon be such medical care centers in all federal states. As part of the negotiations on the regional structural plans for health by 2030, Huss sees the goal of expanding to 300 primary care units throughout Austria.
Doctors in Austria
There are around 10,200 positions for statutory health insurance physicians in Austria. At the beginning of this year, just over 300 were unfilled, around a third of which were in general medicine.
Overall, Austria has around 47,000 doctors and a doctor density of 5.2 doctors per 1000 inhabitants. With this density of doctors, Austria is third in the EU, behind Greece and Portugal
Job.
Yesterday, the federal government reacted almost euphorically to the ÖGK’s announcement that it would launch the “Plus 100” initiative. This means that the promise to create 100 additional statutory health insurance doctor positions has been kept, said Chancellor Karl Nehammer (VP).
