Safe, hygienic vein treatments, consultation at London Bridge Plastic Surgery

Treatment of the venous system requires the utmost safety and hygiene. At our vein clinic, we put a maximum emphasis on optimal safety.

In the following sections, you will learn about our standards – feel free to ask us, the personnel in our vein clinic or the supervisory authorities responsible for us if you would like more details.

Education and Experience

• At the Privates Institut für Chirurgie, all patients are operated on by the medical director himself, Dr. med. Florian Netzer.
• After his 6 years of medical studies, Dr. Netzer has gone through 6 years of training as a specialist in surgery at different clinics, including, among other things, in the fields of vascular surgery, accident surgery, abdominal surgery and plastic surgery.
• Since 1993, he has worked independently and specialised in vascular surgery, where he has completed many thousands of vein treatments.
• He educates other physicians in the performance of catheter techniques and has modified, improved and adjusted such catheter techniques to suit the high hygienic demands of our vein clinic.
• He has carried out several thousand catheter treatments on the veins himself and regularly invites other vein doctors from Europe and overseas as guests for advanced training.
• He performs research in the field of vein surgery, is author of the "Book on veins" ("Das Venenbuch") (published by Schlütersche Verlagsgesellschaft) and often carries out more than 10 of these procedures per surgical day in the clinic (up to three times a week)

Safety in the Operating Theatre and in the Vein Clinic

• Our vein treatments are carried out exclusively at surgical centres and in a clinic in Munich, and not in a private practice or "practice clinic".
• For each catheter treatment – even when performed under local anaesthesia – there is always an experienced specialist for anaesthesia present who constantly monitors and takes care of the patient, and who can immediately intervene in the event that any unforeseen incident might occur. The expanded local anaesthesia (or regional anaesthesia), as is frequently necessary for routine catheter treatment, requires a sufficient quantity of such local anaesthetics as Xylocaine or Mepivacaine, which occasionally cause undesirable side effects such as cardiac arrhythmia or severe allergic states of shock and/or seizures. Such complications are naturally very rare, but also grave. The anaesthetist who is always present is therefore necessary in order to immediately avert such dangers.
• After the vein treatment, our patients spend one to several hours under the care of trained, specialist nurses and doctors in the "post anaesthesia care unit" (PACU) while constantly being monitored until they can be discharged free of complaints and safely return home or to the hotel, or to a station of the clinic: this guarantees that the patient is also optimally provided for after their treatment.
• After the vein treatment, our doctors are at the disposal of our patients around the clock and on any day of the year (i.e. "24/7").
• Our operating theatres are equipped with all instruments, medicines, devices and technical staff so that any severe complications can be dealt with immediately and without any delay.

Vein surgery hygiene

• Although it is not required by any means, we perform all of our catheter surgery in operating theatres which demonstrate the highest class of hygiene of "1 B". These theatres are supplied with disinfected pure air provided by way of a "laminar flow system" so that this air flows with excessive pressure over the surgical table and contamination from outside can optimally be avoided.
• Joint-replacement surgery, which requires the highest degree of hygienic demands of all surgery, for instance, can only be permitted in operating theatres with such a supreme degree of cleanliness.
• We work exclusively (and especially generously) with sterile, one-way draping materials (at a high price).
• All of our vein doctors, surgical nurses and assistant physicians who are active beside the table receive a new sterile surgical dress for each new procedure, similar to joint replacements. They are all trained physicians, surgical nurses or surgical technical assistants. Only personnel designated as having this certified training have been educated in the use of sterile instruments and devices, which enables them to perform each vein surgery procedure in a flawless, hygienic manner. Doctor\\\'s assistants (medical assistants) and those in other similar professions (even trained nurses and orderlies without any advanced training) do not have the necessary qualifications to perform these activities.
• All our catheters are guaranteed to be used only once: a renewed sterilisation of the catheter is not possible. Their re-use, as is unfortunately becoming more common, can, for example, pass dried blood from one patient into the body of the next patient! We give each of our patients his/her own individual catheter after their vein surgery so that it is clear that it cannot be "prepared" and then used again. Concerning the topic of "preparations" and "re-use" of catheters, please also see the study described below.

The vein clinic

The Iatros-Klinik in Munich is an ultra-modern clinic with 5 operating theatres of the highest class of hygiene ("1 B"), conducted by three experienced specialists in anaesthesia (Dr. Girisch, Dr. Hattensberger and Dr. Schmitt-Hausser).

In the clinic, up to 70 interventions are performed per day, mostly out-patient treatments, but also those carried out for in-patients. In most fields (see operating theatres) the prescribed hygienic standards for the interventions performed are "exceeded", i.e. once again, more severely controlled.

The surgical instruments are prepared in the vein clinic\\\'s own sterilisation unit by technical staff and sterilised under rigid controls (with logged records).

In our opinion, standards like those seen in the Iatros-Klinik can only be guaranteed in such professional surgical centres or appropriate clinics: a practise or even a "practise clinic" (that is a practise with overnight accommodation for at least one patient, if required) cannot provide these high hygienic and personnel requirements, simply for economic reasons.

To be able to always operate under optimal hygienic conditions and to guarantee optimum safety, even in the event of an emergency, we have decided – despite the higher costs - to perform no interventions in our own rooms. Instead, we perform all catheter treatments and vein surgery procedures only in the Iatros-Klinik, which provides the desired and unusually high standards as far as both personnel and technology are concerned.

Iatros-Klinik hygiene certificate (Translation)

Iatros-Klinik ISO-certification (Translation)

Iatros-Klinik ISO-certification in anaesthesiology (Translation)

Technical Equipment for treating venous diseases at the vein clinic in Munich:

Optimal equipment, which always meets the latest technical standards, means constant high investments for such an institute as ours. Through our specialisation and the high number of equal treatments, this is possible for our institute and we consider it to be the greatest of values.

For this reason, we also have, among other things,

• a modern colour-coded duplex sonography from General Electrics
• several radio-frequency generators (for the improbable event of a malfunction during treatment)
• an ultra-modern thermography unit
• a technically "up-to-date" plethysmography (for the measurement of volumetric changes in the extremities)
• the most powerful Nd:YAG laser from the Candela Company,
• the most modern "steam-vein sclerosis" ("SVS") device for the hot steam injection in unhealthy veins
• a new complete endoscope unit for the removal of unhealthy truncal veins by means of endoscopy

The personnel at our vein clinic in Munich

In the clinic, during the treatment/vascular surgery, the patients are exclusively taken care of by medical technical staff who have undergone a special German training:

• Surgical nurses: trained nurses with several years of additional schooling (with an exam) as a surgical nurse, who also have experience in the largest and most complicated of interventions and their optimal sterile performance, even when under stress.
• Surgical technical assistants: equivalent to the traditionally educated surgical nurse (see above).
• Specialists for anaesthesia: doctors who, after their medical studies for at least 6 years, have undergone 5 years of specialist training (with an exam) to become a specialist in anaesthesia. Specialists for all kinds of anaesthetics (from local anaesthesia up to general anaesthesia), emergency medicine and reanimation.

Only a large surgical centre or an appropriate clinic can always make such technical staff available even for catheter treatments.

At our vein clinic, we work exclusively in this manner.

Advanced Training

The entire medical and non-medical personnel of the vein clinic continuously undergo both internal and external further education, and are also tested for their success.

Our vein doctors, and especially the director of the institute, Dr. Florian Netzer, visit congresses and take advanced training worldwide on the topic of vascular and vein surgery, which is registered by the Bavarian State Chamber of Physicians.

Insurance

All our doctors have excellent liability insurance.

The director of the institute, Dr. med. Florian Netzer (a specialist in vein surgery), has been insured for many years by the sound and well-renowned "Versicherungskammer Bayern" ("Bavarian Chamber of Insurances") with its very high guaranteed amounts.

Only in this way can it be ensured that a patient, in the improbable event of damages, will receive appropriately high levels of compensation.


Costs for Safety and Hygiene

Naturally, these measures for optimal safety and hygiene during vascular surgery all cost a great deal of money: the optimal equipment of an operating theatre with pure-air air-conditioning units, optimal respiration, modern monitors and a truly qualified technical staff (specialists for anaesthesia, surgical nurses, nurses specialised in anaesthesia, etc.) is immensely expensive.

It is expensive to use new, originally-packaged sterile catheters for each new patient, e.g. from the VNUS Company (Covidien): it would essentially be more economical to have catheters prepared from appropriate companies "with a guarantee".

Nevertheless, we are unwavering in our opinion that we do not want to spare anything in terms of safety and hygiene, and that we must provide our patients with optimal conditions.

That necessitates higher costs so that we are consequently more expensive, on occasion, than our competitors.

Please take a look at the cost of our vein treatments.