Quality management in occupational dermatology

Abstract

Health care of patients with occupational dermatitis (OD) in the sense of suspected ``BK 5101'' is carried out in Germany within the optimized dermatologist's procedure and the ``dermal intervention'' (formerly: hierarchical multistep intervention approach) of the statutory accident insurance (UVT), respectively. Dermatologists and UVT administrators are obliged to improve OD patient care by continuous quality management measures. Essential quality management elements include the research projects EVA_Haut and VVH, the clearing procedure of the Task Force on Occupational and Environmental Dermatology (ABD), training of dermatologists to receive the CME certificate ``Occupational Dermatology (ABD)'', the establishment of processing standards for administrators and optimized dermatologist's report forms (based on the results of all the above steps taken). It was shown that the optimized dermatologist's procedure and ``dermal intervention'' are established in Germany. Also, the available preventive and therapeutic measures for OD patients are effective. Despite the increase of cases with suspected OD, the number of cases in which a career change was required is almost constant (3 %); at the same time the percentage of notified cases which, as a result, are covered within the dermatologist's procedure by the UVT is rising (86 %). The measures recently taken have continuously increased quality of health care in occupational dermatology.