Björn Vrooman Jan 20, 2017:

Here's someone confirming what I just said:

"Am German, can't agree whole-heartedly. What you're saying is true in theory, but there are increasingly big problems.
Doctors get more money out of top-tier patients (private healthcare). So they understandably spend more time on treating the same issue if you're rich. They also recommend add-on treatment not covered by public healthcare to bottom-tier patients. If they don't want to pay extra, some doctors will visibly hate that - and sometimes even refuse to treat the patient at all. That's not what the system intends, but that's what some doctors do because of the system. Doctors have to offer a certain number of office hours per week or month on public healthcare patients. Once they've got their hours, many of them simply don't accept any of them for the rest of the month. Unless of course they pay extra for a fast-pass."
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/573sp3/doctors_o...

Björn Vrooman Jan 20, 2017:

Hello Lesley I think Lancashireman is on the right track here (second suggestion). If you don't want to use "non-private," the alternative would be "public healthcare." But Phil is right, without any context, it's hard to tell. Somehow, I assume "Sprechstunde" isn't necessarily translated here.

@Lancashireman
"Regular" is a bit complicated (at least in Germany). My skin doctor has regular hours from Monday through Thursday. On Friday, it's "nach Vereinbarung."

And it gets even more complicated. A German doctor can have regular hours, but they may be split between public insurance and private patients.

"Wir bieten in unserer Praxis erheblich mehr Sprechstundenzeiten an, sehen aber aufgrund der Systembegrenzungen, die uns durch die Leistungs- und Medikamentenbudgets auferlegt sind, keine Möglichkeit die Kassensprechstunden noch weiter auszubauen.[...]Getrennt von unseren Kassensprechstunden bieten wir ausschließlich für Privatpatienten eigene Privatsprechstunden an."
http://www.augenarzt-hn.de/index.php?id=13

You make appointments for both. You may get one a few months earlier, though, if you're a private patient.

philgoddard Jan 20, 2017:

You haven't actually given us the German context.

Lesley Robertson MA, Dip Trans IoLET (asker) Jan 19, 2017:

@ Lancashireman No, but the sentence is rather long-winded already so I would like to keep this as short and to-the-point as possible.

Lancashireman Jan 19, 2017:

"I need to put this succinctly" Is there a limit on the number of characters here, Lesley?