[Further development of urology in the tension field of surgical and molecular medicine].

Methods based on molecular biology and molecular medicine now have important practical applications in many areas of theoretical and clinical medicine, and it is no longer possible to imagine life without them. This means that in a largely surgical discipline, such as urology, completely new challenges are coming to the fore, which urology, as an academic and clinical discipline, now has to face up to, and to a much greater degree than hitherto. However, there is less and less freedom of action in any university department of urology, as a result not only of intensified legal outline conditions in the healthcare sector and tight public budgets, but also of faculty- and hospital-specific blocks to innovation. There is an urgent need for the creation of appropriate outline conditions and innovative structures that will allow efficient surgical care and also an efficient way of working scientifically.