Electronic Patient Record: Groups Demand Full Reset of Health IT

Several associations in Germany are calling for a complete restart of healthcare digitalisation. In their view, the electronic patient record (ePA) in its current form is useless.

The demand comes from a group of organisations that want the country's digital health strategy rethought from the ground up rather than patched step by step. Their verdict on the ePA is blunt: as it stands today, the record does not deliver the benefit that patients, doctors and other care providers were promised.

Why it matters

The electronic patient record is meant to be the central place where medical information such as findings, diagnoses and medication is stored and shared across practices, hospitals and pharmacies. If the associations are right and the tool is of little practical use, the effort put into rolling it out by practices and insured people is questionable, and so is the trust in future digital health services.

The call for a reset also puts pressure on policymakers. A restart would mean questioning technical and organisational decisions made so far, instead of simply continuing along the current path.

What comes next

Whether politicians and the bodies responsible for Germany's health telematics will take up the demand remains to be seen. The associations are pushing for a fundamental course correction, not for minor adjustments to the existing record. Details of their proposals were not available at the time of writing.