Medical care with or without cooperative agreements? A cross-sectional study in nursing homes in Bremen and Lower Saxony

Empirical studies in nursing homes show that people in need of long-term care have less contact with medical specialists (except for neurologists) compared to those of the same age who are not in need of long-term care, which can be an indication of insufficient health care provision. Against this background, a cooperative agreement between medical specialists and nursing homes was first made legally possible, then requested and finally made mandatory (section 119b SGB V [Social Code Book V] in the currently valid version). The aim of this study is to investigate to what extent contact density to physicians and the needs-based medical treatment of nursing home residents in nursing homes with and without a cooperative agreement differ from each other and, hence, how effective such cooperation agreements are in this context. Using data from 396 people in need of care from 44 nursing homes in Lower Saxony and Bremen we compared facilities with and without cooperative agreements with respect to the number of home visits, practice visits and telephone contacts and the realization of adequate specialist medical treatment. At the time of the survey, 26 of the 44 nursing homes had cooperative agreements with dentists, 17 with general practitioners and 7 with neurologists. The number of personal contacts to general practitioners tends to be higher if cooperation agreements between general practitioners and nursing homes exist. In nursing homes having cooperation agreements with dentists the number of home visits is twice as high as in nursing homes without such an agreement, whereas cooperation agreements with neurologists have no effect on the number of contacts with these specialists. Furthermore, cooperation agreements with dentists promote appropriate dental care. The results show that cooperation agreements can be a useful instrument to ensure medical care in nursing homes. To guarantee the effectiveness of the cooperation agreements, however, the number of medical visits should be stipulated in the agreements.