[Ambulatory surgery--financing from the viewpoint of health insurance]

New regulations, which have been implied by the Health Structure Act, are aiming to improve the coordination between ambulant and in-patient-surgery. In the view of the health insurance scheme, this could be the beginning of a new era in the health care system of Germany. Following a short presentation of these new regulations and of the opportunities to cut down expenses by ambulatory surgery, the author describes the development of ambulatory surgery in the private-practice-setting. He presents the framework for ambulatory surgery in hospitals, which has been created by negotiations on a national level, and he draws future perspectives of ambulatory surgery.