Health City Berlin / Germany

Health treatment in Berlin has a long tradition. The Charité hospital as well as scientists such as Robert Koch, Rudolf Virchow and Ferdinand Sauerbruch affected German and intenational health-science. In addition to basic medical care, there are numerous facilities for specialized treatment which are used not only by the people of Berlin. There are the Max Delbrück Centrum (Max Delbrück Centrum für Molekulare Medizin in Berlin Buch), the German Heart Center (Deutsche Herzzentrum), transplant and laser medicine, bone marrow transplants and the use of computer-assisted operating techniques in mouth, jaw and face operations.
Berlin forms Germany's largest centre of medical activity.

There are some key location advantages on Berlin health care city are an outstanding international scientific environment, excelent supply networks and leading medical facilities, over 120 hospitals in Berlin-Brandenburg, R&D test-market for pharmaceutical products, medical devices and materials, cooperations on basic research, development and application enabled by companies and research institutes, cooperation between medicine, biotechnology, chemistry and optical technology.

Ca. 150 companies manifacturing medical technology in Berlin, the emphasis on cardiology, laser-medicine, minimal invasive medicine, radiation therapy and biomedicine (for companies see: www.tsbmedici.de, Centre of Medical Technology Berlin). The total sales of Berlin's health market are ca. 17,44 billion Euro. 16% of GDP is spent on health, the national average is 11%. Berlin offers the highest hospital density in Germany with 68.8 beds per 10.000 inhabitants.

The costs of health care made structural changes necessary. The number of hospital beds, for instance, has been reduced to around 22,000. Despite this reduction, patient care will continue to be secured.