Pharmacy staff express concerns over malfunctions in electronic prescription system
The electronic prescription system in Germany, designed to streamline the process and reduce the need for manual signatures and doctor visits, has been facing significant issues in recent weeks. These problems mainly involve frequent technical disruptions and instability of the telematics infrastructure that supports the electronic health services.
According to Thomas Preis, the head of the Federal Association, there have been five days of complete failures or significant impairments in the E-prescription system or the underlying telematics infrastructure in the past two weeks. These interruptions have caused problems such as inability to access or redeem e-prescriptions, difficulties signing prescriptions by doctors, and partial outages affecting the electronic patient record and communication services.
These disruptions have a direct impact on patients, with each outage affecting tens of thousands of individuals. The issues have led to chaos in pharmacies and caused frustration among pharmacists and patients relying on the system.
Thomas Preis compared a delayed train to an unretrievable E-prescription, stating that the latter can have serious consequences for people's health. He emphasized the need for the digitization of the healthcare system, but stated that the current unreliability of the E-prescription system is unacceptable.
In response to these issues, the ABDA (Federal Union of German Associations of Pharmacists) has urged Gematik, the agency responsible for these digital health services, to enhance the system’s reliability due to the frequent and recurring outages. Gematik acknowledges the issues caused largely by external providers and is presumably working on mitigating these dependencies and improving stability, though concrete technical solutions or timelines are not detailed in the current information.
The broader modernization push under Germany’s Hospital Future Act requires information system upgrades by 2027, which will likely also drive improvements in digital health infrastructure. Additionally, the need for robust technical infrastructure and security to better handle data transmissions and maintain compliance in online pharmacy consultations suggests that stakeholders are aware of necessary enhancements to support the e-prescription system effectively.
It is crucial for Gematik to ensure that pharmacies and doctor's practices can work in a stable E-prescription system. The goal of the E-prescription system is more comfort and fewer trips to the doctor's practice, and it is hoped that with improved reliability, it will achieve this goal.
The community and employment policies of Gematik should address the concerns of pharmacists and patients regarding the current instability of the E-prescription system, to ensure a more stable and secure employment environment for all involved. In the context of Germany's Hospital Future Act, which aims to modernize the healthcare system, it is essential that science, medical-conditions, health-and-wellness, and technology are factored into the development of a robust and dependable e-prescription system that prioritizes the health and wellness of patients.
