Arithmetik der Traumaversorgung

Interventions in the sense of a surgical session according to SGB V are determined for the most part from the number of general anaesthetics induced for the department. The capacity of an operating theatre can be calculated from experience at 4–6 operations per day, that is to say 1,000 operations per year if 200 full operating days per year are assumed. If we assume that 80% of patients in the trauma surgery department do undergo operative treatment, that the average time each patient is then occupying a bed is 7 days, and that the rate of bed use is 85%, this means that for every 1,000 surgical operations an average of 28.3 beds must be reserved – as a rule of thumb, between 20 and 30 beds for each operating theatre. In Germany, 1000 surgical patients in a trauma surgery department means 200 injured as defined by GUV; on average the injuries are serious in 25% of these cases. Speed in trauma surgery is defined in increments of 1,000 operations performed per year. Thus, double speed means 2,000 operative cases per year, two operating theatres in constant use and the treatment of 500 seriously injured patients needing trauma surgery. The rough figures mentioned can be used as a quantifiable basis for estimation of the performance structure of trauma surgery departments in Germany.