Medicine & Healthcare

Essen is known as the Gesundheitstadt, the “city of health”. This title derives not only from the fact that the health sector, with more than 40,000 jobs in Essen, plays a major part in the city’s economy, but is also a reflection of the fact that global forecasts of growth for the health industry, together with the potential for research already in place (at the university, university hospital and other leading hospitals), open up significant economic opportunities for the city.

Two current examples of the interdependence between medical research and healthcare at the highest international level are the “Westdeutsche Protonentherapie Zentrum Essen”, a proton treatment centre currently being set up at the University Hospital, and the newly established magnetic resonance research centre “Erwin L. Hahn Institute for Magnetic Resonance Imaging” at the Zeche Zollverein.

To convert this research potential into jobs and added value, EWG - Essener Wirtschaftsförderungsgesellschaft mbH (Essen Economic Development Agency) specialises particularly on intensive consultancy and support for new business start-ups. This also includes acting as a go-between in finding suitable locations, such as ETEC (the Essen Technology and Development Center), the TripleZ centre for new business start-ups, or the Medizinisches Zentrum (medical centre) in the Hindenburgstraße.

A further element in promoting this sector of industry are the exemplary and well-developed local networks. The network of local health service providers (“Essen forscht und heilt” - “Research & Healing in Essen”) and the “Medical Wednesday”, a joint sectoral meeting, facilitate exchange of information, communication and co-operation between industry, science and service providers.The “Essen forscht und heilt” (research and healing in Essen) agency is at the EWG.

The health portal - www.essen.de/gesundheit - offers a comprehensive range of information on services and offers in Essen related to health. In addition to up-to-date reports and notices of events, it is also possible to access extensive information on the health aspects of Essen.

Close co-operation between companies in the health sector and in information technology is one of the stated objectives for the future.

Intelligent IT solutions for doctors, hospitals, health insurers etc. are rapidly gaining in importance. The EWG, as co-founder of the networks “Essen forscht und heilt” and “networker essen”, sees itself as a catalyst for innovative products and services at the interface between health and localised information processing. This development also finds practical expression in an annual specialist conference held in Essen (“IT Trends Medizin/Health Telematics”), and in the creation of the model region of Bochum-Essen to develop a telematics infrastructure for health, an initiative which has gained national recognition in Germany.