This edition results from the research initiation project Arteria danubia (ArDa), with which a research association of Danube riparian states was established. The subject were and are health regions, which have to cope with very heterogeneous challenges due to their different starting situations in Germany, Hungary and Bulgaria. Health regions, as described in this work from five perspectives, represent a primarily organisational category in which health is managed. In addition, digital search engines and assistance systems are becoming more and more important - in the narrower context of health regions. Therefore, another thematic block deals with the topics of health literacy and these very search engines. Which are used how, and on what cognitive basis? It goes without saying that the therapy of patients affected by severe changes also takes place in the regions. Two oncological and one contribution to dehydrogenation prophylaxis constitute this third perspective of the book.

Manfred Cassens, corresponding author, is full-time professor at the FOM Hochschule für Oekonomie und Management at the Munich University Centre. He is also Director of the Institute for Health & Social Affairs (ifgs).

Zsófia Katalin Kollányi is doctoral lecturer at the Eötvös Loránd University, Faculty of Social Sciences.

Alexandar Tsenov is dean of the German Faculty at the Technical University of Sofia.