It’s no secret that a lot has gone wrong in the digitization of the German healthcare system. Or, as Thomas Renner , Head of the Digitization and Innovation sub-department at the Federal Ministry of Health ( BMG ), aptly put it yesterday at the BMC conference on »Connectivity for Health « in Berlin : »We are caught in a dilemma. « He sees one problem, among other things, in the fact that in the past nobody has consistently considered the user orientation of digital applications. That too is about to change. Because, as the digital expert reported during the panel discussion, theBMG a priority list for the next digitization steps.
At the BMC conference in Berlin on Wednesday the 19th October, Dr Thomas Renner, a digital expert with the Federal Health Ministry of Germany, revealed what is on the ministry’s list of digital priorities, Pharmazeutische Zeitung reports.
Dr Thomas Renner is Head of the Digitization and Innovation sub-department at the Federal Ministry of Health (BMG) stated at the BMC conference “Connectivity for Health”: “We are caught in a dilemma”. He sees one problem, among other things, in the fact that in the past nobody has consistently considered usability of digital applications. It will change, because, as the digital expert reported during the panel discussion, usability is on the BMG’s priority list for the next digitization steps.
According to Renner, it is about “creating clear responsibilities, who is responsible for what in the digital process, and which structural data should end up on the EPA first”. And there is also a timetable: by 2026, structured data should be on the Electronic Patient Record (EPA).
According to Renner , prioritizing interoperability and setting international standards is already part of the BMG ‘s specifications . Also against the background of making high-quality health data available promptly for primary and secondary use. By this he means, on the one hand , the European health data space that the EU Commission is currently planning, and on the other hand he is alluding to the health data usage law that the governing parties wrote in their coalition agreement .