Your rights during your stay in hospital

Your doctor is obliged to inform you about examinations, treatment options and procedures. This duty to inform is only waived if immediate action is necessary. Planned examinations, interventions and treatments are only carried out after you have been informed and with your consent.

Our staff are bound by professional secrecy (medical confidentiality). We will only provide third parties with information about your state of health with your consent (or if required by law). However, we assume that you have given your consent if we pass on information to your caregivers, pre- and post-treatment doctors and other persons providing further treatment.

You can designate reference persons yourself. If no reference persons are named, your partner or close relatives are considered to be reference persons.

The University Hospital Zurich is committed to medical research. When you are admitted to hospital, you will therefore be informed about the research with data and samples and asked for your consent. This consent is voluntary.

You may also be asked whether you would like to take part in a clinical trial to test new treatment methods or drugs. Medical progress is unthinkable without the support of patients. We therefore ask you to support our research whenever possible. The knowledge gained will benefit the patients of today and tomorrow.

Of course, you have the right to refuse participation or to revoke your decision – without any disadvantages for your treatment.

The hospital is obliged to keep patient documentation for all patients. This provides information about the clarification and treatment (examinations, diagnoses, therapy, care). The patient documentation must be kept for at least 10 years after the end of the last treatment at the USZ.

The patient documentation is the property of the hospital. As a patient, you can request access to the patient documentation and are entitled to receive copies (the hospital may charge a fee for this). You can also request that the original patient documentation be returned to you if it would otherwise be destroyed after the retention period has expired.

The task of the ombudsman commission is to mediate in the event of differences of opinion between the USZ and patients. We aim to find a satisfactory solution for all parties involved through open and constructive discussions.

The service is free of charge for patients who request it. Please address placement requests and inquiries to the President Monika Binkert.

Members

• RA Dr. iur. Monika Binkert, President
• Gabi Brenner, Director of Nursing and Co-Director of DPM
• Dr. med. Verena Broger Ribi, FMH General Internal Medicine, General Practitioner, Zollikon
• Pastor Susanna Meyer Kunz, Head of Reformed Hospital Chaplaincy USZ
• PD Dr. med. Matthis Schick, Head Physician, Clinic for Consultative Psychiatry and Psychosomatics USZ
• KD Dr. med. Peter Steiger, Deputy Chairman Director of the Institute of Intensive Care Medicine

Documents

• Regulations of the Ombudsman Commission at the University Hospital Zurich, April 29, 2020 (PDF)
• “My rights and obligations – information on hospitalization” (PDF, brochure from the Health Department of the Canton of Zurich)

• Information from the Canton of Zurich on the subject of patients’ rights
• Swiss Patient Organization (SPO)
• Umbrella organization of Swiss patient centers
• Cantonal Ethics Committee Zurich