Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach is counting on rapid positive effects through the launch of electronic patient records (ePA) for all insured persons at the beginning of next year. The ePA will lead to better and less bureaucratic care, said the SPD politician in Berlin at the start of an information campaign. The general practitioners’ association warned that the e-file must be technically stable. Lauterbach made it clear that the practices’ software systems should work quickly with the ePA in the future.

According to a law from the traffic light coalition, all insured people will have an e-file created by their health insurance company at the beginning of 2025 – unless they reject it. It is intended to be a digital storage device for information on medications, findings and laboratory values ​​and to accompany patients throughout their lives. This is also intended to avoid treatment errors, unnecessary multiple examinations and drug interactions.

First model phase for 4 weeks

The ePA is scheduled to start on January 15, 2025, initially in two model regions in Franconia and Hamburg. It is expected to be available to patients, practices, clinics and pharmacies nationwide four weeks later. E-files were already introduced in 2021 as an optional offer that you have to take care of yourself. However, they have hardly been used so far.

Lauterbach said: “We definitely don’t want there to be an implementation that in practice causes more trouble than it helps.” Therefore, the e-file was technically redesigned. The managing director of the majority federally owned digital company Gematik, Florian Fuhrmann, explained that the new architecture should increase stability and enable more powerful applications.

Family doctors want to answer questions – but not alone

The chairman of the general practitioners’ association, Markus Beier, said that problems such as those with the start of electronic prescriptions should not be repeated. The practices would endeavor to answer many questions from patients about the new e-file. However, given the start of the infection season, she could not do this alone.

68 of the 95 health insurance companies have now started providing mandatory information for all 75 million people with statutory health insurance, as the head of the umbrella association, Doris Pfeiffer, said. The rest would start in October with direct information by letter, email or via the cash register app. She emphasized: “The ePA is and remains voluntary.” You can object to the institution in advance or later at any time. According to feedback, less than three percent of those contacted so far objected, saying this was a “very good interim result”.

Information campaign starts

The Federal Ministry of Health is now starting an information campaign on the Internet, with posters and spots on radio and television, as Lauterbach said. In addition, an information bus is scheduled to tour several German cities in October.

Treating doctors each receive access rights for 90 days to read and fill in reports and laboratory values ​​- triggered when you insert your insurance card in the practice or clinic. For example, patients can use the app to set which information is visible to doctors.

Patient representatives with demands

The German Foundation for Patient Protection criticized the fact that the ePA was initially a paper collection that could be viewed digitally. “Doctors have to read every single document in order to filter out the medically necessary information,” said board member Eugen Brysch. The ePA currently does not have artificial intelligence that processes and links data. It would also be important for the chronically ill, the elderly and those in need of care if all old findings were automatically available.

The social association VdK warned that the registration process was too complicated for many. Lauterbach referred to the planned option for older people, for example, to have the ePA activated in pharmacies using a smartphone and the electronic health card.