[Changes in the spectrum of the health provision contract and their effects on education, graduate education, research, quality of treatment and continuing development of surgery].

The legal "contract for patient care" issued by the Federal Government for all hospitals interferes with graduate medical education (approbation order), postgraduate surgical training, the KMK paper for new structures and financing of university medicine, health politics of the Physicians Parliament and the Legal Health System, guidelines for surgical practice, internal and external quality measurement, and, last but not least, with clinical research in surgery. The different effects are outlined in detail.