Sustainable and patient-centered emergency care, even for low-priority calls for assistance, was discussed at the 3rd Fürth Conference organized by INOB. The findings have now been published in the journal *Notfall + Rettungsmedizin* (Springer Medizin).
The title of the publication is “Focus on Low-Priority Calls for Assistance: Recommendations from the Fürth Talks on Professionalization and Training in Emergency Medical Services”—an important topic for the future of emergency care. In response to the growing number of calls that do not require traditional emergency medical services but where there is nevertheless an acute need for assistance, the article presents practical solutions for cross-sectoral, community-based, and case-resolving acute care.
The publication drew on the expertise of the approximately 40 participants in the interdisciplinary expert forum—representing emergency medical services, medicine, science, dispatch centers, and other specialized organizations—regarding the future structure of out-of-hospital emergency care. The central issue was achieving better integration between emergency medical services and outpatient care, as well as the necessary qualifications, structures, and legal framework for this.
This resulted in 13 recommendations for action, ranging from the establishment of a nationwide, standardized system of out-of-hospital acute care to the development of a digitally networked health management system and a tiered qualification system for new professional roles in emergency medical services. All of these recommendations aim to ensure care tailored to patient needs, relieve the burden on emergency medical services and emergency departments, and simultaneously strengthen the quality of emergency care in a sustainable manner.
Experts from numerous institutions contributed to the publication. The lead contributors were Klaus Meyer (INOB), Prof. Dr. med. Harald Dormann (INOB/Fürth Hospital), Bernd Landsleitner (INOB), Prof. Dr. Stephan Prückner (INM), Johannes Gottschalk (BRK), Christoph Redelsteiner (Research & Teaching in Emergency Medical Services), Dominik Hinzmann (University Hospital of the Technical University of Munich), Dominik Hahnen (Malteser Education Center Euregio), Insa Seeger (Oldenburger Land Emergency Dispatch Center), Tom Malysch (Institute for Emergency Medicine), and Prof. Dr. Thomas Prescher (University of Applied Sciences Münster).
The publication is available free of charge from Springer Nature as part of its open-access initiative and can be accessed here.