Anyone wishing to operate a private hospital (private clinic) requires a license under commercial law. According to commercial law, a hospital is a facility that is used for the treatment and care of patients and where patients are treated as inpatients, i.e. where they are also accommodated and fed.

Only private, commercially operated hospitals require such a license. Public institutions and those operated for charitable, benevolent or scientific purposes do not require a permit. In contrast to these, the entrepreneur operating the private hospital has the intention of making a profit from the operation.

The entrepreneur may or may not be a doctor. If the entrepreneur is a doctor, a distinction must be made between facilities that serve the exercise of their liberal professional activity (e.g. the surgeon's clinic) and facilities that are not directly related to the liberal professional activity and are designed to make a profit.

The license indicates whether the facility is used to operate a private hospital, a private maternity hospital or a private mental hospital (or a combination of these facilities). Homes in which mentally ill or mentally disabled people are accommodated and only occasional medical care is provided are not private hospitals.