[Addressing racism-related discrimination against employees in German hospitals: Results of an organizational survey].

Authors

Tuğba Aksakal, Philipp Ostermann, Kübra Annac, Fabian Erdsiek, Yüce Yilmaz-Aslan, Patrick Brzoska

Published in

Zeitschrift fur Evidenz, Fortbildung und Qualitat im Gesundheitswesen. Sep 10, 2026. Epub Sep 10, 2026.

Abstract

Racial discrimination against healthcare staff may pose a burden for working conditions, team climate, and the quality of care in hospitals. In Germany, there is limited empirical evidence on how such incidents are addressed organizationally and what complaint and support structures have been implemented. The aim of this study was to describe the handling of racial discrimination against staff in German hospitals from an organizational perspective.
A nationwide online cross-sectional survey of hospitals in Germany was conducted between October and November 2024. Respondents primarily included quality managers, complaint managers, and individuals in leadership or administrative roles. The survey examined the frequency of reported incidents of racial discrimination, their proportion of the total number of complaints, and the availability of complaint, support, and preventive structures.
Representatives from 211 hospitals participated in the survey (response rate: 15.5%). Racial discrimination was reported most frequently in connection with patients (38.4% reported such incidents to occur several times per year or more often) and relatives (26.2%), and less frequently in the context of colleagues (16.2%) and supervisors (6.0%). The proportion of such cases among all complaints was generally estimated to be about 10%. Nearly all institutions reported having formal complaint procedures in place (92.9%), but specialized support services for cases of discrimination were rare (3.0%). While 82.5% of respondents considered preventive measures to be important, only 16.7% perceived racial discrimination as a significant problem for staff.
The findings suggest that racial discrimination is only partially reflected in existing complaint-handling structures. Beyond formal systems, organizational definitions of the problem and structural conditions appear to influence how such incidents are perceived and addressed.
To improve quality, it appears necessary to better align existing complaint and support structures with cases of discrimination and to strengthen the systematic implementation of preventive approaches. The findings provide a basis for the development of practice-oriented recommendations.

PMID:
42722528
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 11 Sep 2026.

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