[Additional personal contributions for minimally invasive surgery : How high is patient acceptance?]

Increasing costs of the healthcare system might decrease the spectrum of insurance financed medical treatment in the future. Therefore we evaluated whether patients are prepared to pay partial costs of their own, especially for minimally invasive surgery. METHODICS: Between 1st July 2007 and 1st July 2008 patients were asked in a prospective trial preoperatively and postoperatively whether they would be prepared to pay an additional invoice of 200 EUR for a minimally invasive operation. Payment was reasoned by the hypothesis that insurance companies will reduce the DRG payment while costs are rising.

A total of 750 patients, men:women=279 (37.2%):471 (62.8%) undergoing elective minimally invasive operations were included in the trial. For the majority of patients (m=266:13; w=448:23) it was very important to be operated on in a center for minimally invasive surgery. Preoperatively and postoperatively the majority of patients voted for individual payment of 200 EUR to make minimally invasive surgery possible (84.4 versus 84.1%, respectively, p=0.79). Although 80.4% (411/511) of patients with national health insurance voted for payment, voting of patients with private insurance was significantly increased to 92.9% (222/239) (p<0.001). Voting for individual payment increased with a rising level of education (p=0.017), job position and income (p<0.001). Furthermore, it was significantly increased in married compared to single patients (86.5% versus 78.4%, respectively, p=0.038).

Before the operations 84.4% of patients voted for additional individual payment for minimally invasive operations but this was dependent on the socio-economic status.