To promote its themes of wellbeing, medical tourism and spas in 2011, the
German National Tourist Board has published three brochures: Wellness Holidays: “Germany – Land of Wellbeing”; “Health Travel: Spas & Health Resorts in Destination Germany”; and “Medical Travel – You’ll be well-looked after in Germany”.
Wellness Holidays covers the broad characteristics of Germany’s spa resorts, treatments and the organizations responsible for ranking and critiquing the facilities. Health Travel provides detailed information about Germany’s spa towns and categorizes them by their locations, treatments and local expertise: mineral and thermal springs; peloids (mud and clay); climatic health resorts (mountains and seaside); those that offer treatments unique to Germany, such as Kneipp, Felke, Schroth, Heilstollen (air in disused caves and mines) and radon (naturally occurring gas) treatments; and Thalassotherapy, which uses genuine sea water and seaweed and massages with Ruegen’s medicinal chalk or body wraps with sea-buckthorn. Medical Travel details the various specialties and practices available to international patients and their families at university clinics.
In Medical Travel, the German National Tourist Board presents leading German hospitals that offer a broad range of treatments in various disciplines. There are over 2000 hospitals in Germany, including 37 university hospitals, 700 public sector and church-owned hospitals and 500 hospitals belonging to private networks. At least 10 % of them have a department dedicated to helping visitors from abroad. 68,000 patients from 169 countries underwent inpatient treatment in Germany in 2008.
Dresden has one of the world’s top diabetes centres, the Medical Clinic and Policlinic III in the
University Clinic Carl Gustav Carus. In Mainz, the University’s endoscopy program is well advanced in detecting many pre-cancerous states. Munich is well known for several different kinds of procedures and practices.
The German Heart Center in Munich (Deutsches Herzzentrum) is renowned for its minimally invasive techniques. In Hamburg, the
University Heart Center of the University of Hamburg specializes in non-surgical options as well as pediatric vascular surgery.
The University Clinic of Schleswig-Holstein, has a very high success rate in living donor liver transplants and also specializes in kidney and pancreas transplants even when blood type between donor and recipient are incompatible. Hamburg also has a pancreas centre and offers cancer research and surgery. In Düsseldorf, the
University Clinic (Universitaetsklinikum) specializes in malignant tumors of the digestive tract, thyroid and lungs. In Nuremberg, the
Neurosurgical Clinic has expertise in the surgical treatment of diseases of the brain and central nervous system.
The Neurosurgical Clinic of the Charite University Clinic Berlin, specialises in neuro-oncology, vascular neurosurgery and spinal neurosurgery; while the
Center for Muscular-Skeletal Surgery (CMSC) offers a wide range of treatments, including trauma surgery, an endoprosthetic center and is well known for its treatment of spinal diseases and injuries and tumors of the muscular-skeletal system. The University clinic at Muenster is known for treating children with cancer.
The Technical University in Munich is a specialized breast cancer centre.
The University of Hamburg-Eppendorf is renowned for its stem cell transplant work as well as for its treatment of diseases related to the blood and lymphatic system. The
University Medical Center is the largest hospital in Northern Germany. University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf with 80 clinics and institutes is again attending
Destination Health in the UK.
