Migrants in the German Healthcare System
"Conference at the Hannover Medical School, September 2nd - 3rd, 2011
The number of doctors, nursing staff, and patients with a migration background is continuously increasing. Can migrants contribute to alleviating the feared shortage of skilled workers in healthcare in Germany? What is the current situation, and what needs to be done to better utilize existing skills? How are migrants themselves cared for by the German healthcare system? What are their expectations regarding healthcare, and where should action be taken to improve care and the use of preventive services? Over the course of two days, researchers from medicine and other disciplines at Hannover Medical School (MHH) will explore these questions. A particular focus will be on the cross-sectional category of gender, as women and men are affected by migration, health, and illness in different ways, and often have different roles as actors in the healthcare system or perceive their roles in different ways.
Opportunity or Challenge? Diversity in Medicine
Lecture Series on the 10th Anniversary of the General Equal Treatment Act (AGG) 2016
For 10 years, Germany has had the General Equal Treatment Act. It is intended to protect against discrimination based on ascribed race or ethnic origin, gender or sexual identity, religion or belief, as well as disability or age. However, the word 'discrimination' is conspicuously absent from the text of the law. What protection does it offer in the workplace, or is it rather a paper tiger?
Prof. Dr. Sibylle Raasch is a legal scholar with a focus on public law and legal gender studies at the University of Hamburg
Medicine was (or is) male – does this still apply today? Currently, the proportion of women in medical studies is 60.7%, in specialist training over 50%, the proportion of female senior doctors ranges from 10% to 70% depending on the field, and in the primary care sector, women make up over 50%. It is therefore high time that female doctors define the conditions for medical outpatient, inpatient, self-employed, and employed work so that we can practice our profession for a long time and without burnout, to the benefit of our patients.
Christine Hidas is the head of the Dialysis Access Center at Darmstadt University Hospital and the chairwoman of the Frankfurt Regional Group of the German Association of Female Doctors (Deutscher Ärztinnenbund e.V.).
When dealing with irritations of gender, the central question is: What is the relationship between the body and psychological experience and behavior, and when can/should a treatment of either the body, the psyche, or both take place? It must therefore be considered when one speaks of a male or female body, when one refers to a male or female gender experience or gender role behavior, and whether all of these cases involve or should involve binary concepts.
Prof. Dr. Herta Richter-Appelt is a sexologist at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf.
The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, action plans, and legal prohibitions of discrimination require universities and the healthcare system to make reasonable accommodations and ensure accessibility for people with disabilities. These issues will be presented and discussed.
Prof. Dr. Felix Welti is a professor of social and health law, rehabilitation, and disability law at the University of Kassel.
Gender differences are increasingly evident in geriatric medicine, some of which have already been incorporated into clinical guidelines. Practically relevant, especially in terms of avoiding undesirable side effects, are differences in the effects of cardiovascular medications. Variations in the aging process have consequences for diagnostic and therapeutic algorithms.
Prof. Dr. Ursula Müller-Werdan is a professor of geriatrics at Charité University Medicine Berlin and the medical director of the Evangelical Geriatric Center in Berlin.
Universities and student unions are increasingly offering counseling and support services for diverse groups of students in order to enhance equality of opportunity. Which student groups can be identified? What are their specific needs? What services are helpful for them?
Linda Wilken is the head of the Social and International Affairs Department at the Student Union of Hannover.
Nearly 20% of the population in Germany has a migration background. Since the agreements to recruit so-called 'guest workers' in the 1960s, a considerable amount of time has passed. One might therefore assume that the particularities of medical and nursing care for people of different origins are well known to the healthcare system, and that equal access to care can be expected.
However, in practice, it is easy to observe that there are still significant barriers to access to healthcare for migrants, which hinder the provision of equal-quality medical care and nursing services.
The group of people with a migration background is very heterogeneous. In particular, older migrants, refugees, young children, undocumented immigrants, and pregnant women have specific needs for medical and nursing support and counseling, which the current healthcare system cannot always adequately meet. For several years, there has been a call for cultural sensitivity in medicine. Whether this is being effectively implemented in practice, however, must be critically examined.
Elisabeth Wesselman works in the Psychological and Psycho-Oncological Service at Klinikum Schwabing, Städtisches Klinikum München GmbH.