The medical care in the German healthcare system is strongly divided into sectors. Hospitals are fundamentally responsible for inpatient treatment, while outpatient care is provided by practicing physicians. Each sector has its own administration, laws and regulations, separate management, and its own financing. This separation is not very sensible from a health policy perspective, as the system is fundamentally designed for competition between the sectors, with each sector trying to allocate as large a share of services and thus remuneration as possible. The goal is to create greater permeability and a stronger integration between the outpatient and inpatient sectors. To this end, the legislator has created a number of opportunities that allow hospitals to enter the outpatient sector and open up new sources of revenue.