By digitizing prescription records and evaluating them, Barmer health insurance claims it could prevent up to 70,000 deaths each year. Barmer’s latest drug report states such results (link in German). In a corresponding model project with 11,000 patients, mortality was reduced by 10 to 20 percent in comparison to conventional medical care. The project provided complete patient information, including past illnesses and drug prescriptions, to general practitioners for the first time in digital form. Aside from that, the doctors were informed of potential risks associated with the therapy, such as dangerous interactions.
Barmer examined for the first time in the report how complex and extensive the medical data is. Over a ten-year period, insured persons over 40 receive an average of 76 prescriptions. More than 100 prescription sheets were issued to 27 percent of the insured. Over the past ten years, the top tenth of insured persons over the age of 90 received 257 or more prescriptions.
A total of 20 active ingredients were prescribed on average. Patients visited 21 different practices on average. Over 50 different practices treated two out of 100 insured persons during this period. Barmer insured around five million people continuously during this period for the purposes of this evaluation.