Digital health made in Germany: how Germany is digitising the health sector?

A key measu­re of quali­ty of life, and thus of a coun­try­’s deve­lop­ment, today is the health and well-being of its citi­zens and access to health care (Kick­busch, Gle­icher, World Health Orga­ni­za­tion, 2012). At the same time, howe­ver, demo­gra­phic chan­ges, staff shor­ta­ges or glo­bal health chal­len­ges such as pan­de­mics make it dif­fi­cult, or even impos­si­ble, for insti­tu­tions to pro­vi­de good health care to the­ir citi­zens. The­re­fo­re, in order to impro­ve the quali­ty of servi­ces pro­vi­ded, sta­te insti­tu­tions incre­asin­gly turn to digi­tal solu­tions when desi­gning public poli­cies. The lat­ter are sup­po­sed to impro­ve the ope­ra­tion of health care, incre­ase its effec­ti­ve­ness and redu­ce costs. With the­ir help, sta­tes also want to meet the expec­ta­tions of citi­zens accu­sto­med to servi­ces pro­vi­ded digi­tal­ly in the pri­va­te sector. 

Altho­ugh digi­ti­sa­tion of heal­th­ca­re (among other things, due to the sen­si­ti­vi­ty of data) is a par­ti­cu­lar­ly dif­fi­cult task for sta­te insti­tu­tions, indi­vi­du­al coun­tries must plan and imple­ment measu­res in this respect. Cur­ren­tly, Euro­pe­an Union coun­tries are tac­kling the digi­ti­sa­tion of health care with vary­ing degre­es of suc­cess. For exam­ple, in the Ber­tel­smann Foun­da­tio­n’s Digi­tal Health Index, Esto­nia is ran­ked first among 17 coun­tries [1] exa­mi­ned, among other things, in terms of tech­no­lo­gi­cal sophi­sti­ca­tion, stra­te­gy or use of digi­tal poten­tial in health care (Thiel et al., 2018, p. 95). Ger­ma­ny and Poland are ran­ked 16th and 17th respec­ti­ve­ly (Thiel et al., 2018, pp. 54 and 168). The pace of deve­lop­ment dyna­mics of indi­vi­du­al coun­tries depends on size (both in terms of geo­gra­phy and popu­la­tion), insti­tu­tio­nal set­tings, bud­gets allo­ca­ted to health care and its digi­tal deve­lop­ment. Cul­tu­ral fac­tors (first of all, the atti­tu­de of socie­ties to the issue of per­so­nal data) and the abi­li­ty of public insti­tu­tions to build stra­te­gies and think long-term abo­ut the digi­ti­sa­tion of the sta­te are also of key importance. 

During the semi­nar, Wero­ni­ka Prze­cher­ska will show how Ger­ma­ny – a coun­try with a popu­la­tion of over 80 mil­lion, a coun­try with a com­plex admi­ni­stra­ti­ve and heal­th­ca­re sys­tem struc­tu­re – is coping with the deve­lop­ment of digi­tal health. At the begin­ning of the third deca­de of the 21st cen­tu­ry, Ger­ma­ny is not a Euro­pe­an leader in this field, but recent years have seen dyna­mic chan­ges, such as the intro­duc­tion of elec­tro­nic medi­cal records or the pio­ne­ering of the pre­scrip­tion app solu­tion. And altho­ugh the pan­de­mic has some­what slo­wed down this dyna­mic deve­lop­ment, it has also raised awa­re­ness of the impor­tan­ce of digi­tal heal­th­ca­re solu­tions among Ger­mans who are scep­ti­cal of tech­no­lo­gi­cal innovations. 

[1] Among the coun­tries listed in the ran­king, accor­ding to the sco­re from highest to lowest, are: Esto­nia, Cana­da, Den­mark, Isra­el, Spa­in, UK (NHS England), Swe­den, Por­tu­gal, Nether­lands, Austria, Austra­lia, Ita­ly, Bel­gium, Swit­zer­land, Fran­ce, Ger­ma­ny, Poland.

Biblio­gra­phy
Kick­busch, I., Gle­icher, D. , World Health Orga­ni­za­tion (2012). Gover­nan­ce for health for the 21st cen­tu­ry. Copen­ha­gen, Den­mark: World Health Orga­ni­za­tion, Regio­nal Offi­ce for Euro­pe. Down­lo­aded from LINK: (acces­sed 19.10.2020).
Thiel, R., Deimel, L., Schmidt­mann, D., Pie­sche, K., Hüsing, T., Ren­noch, J., Stro­et­mann, V., Stro­et­mann, K. (2018). #Smar­tHe­al­th­Sys­tems. Inter­na­tio­nal com­pa­ri­son of digi­tal stra­te­gies. Ber­tel­smann Sti­ftung, empi­ri­ca. Down­lo­aded from LINK: (acces­sed: 5.04.2021).