The Potential of a Large IT Service Company for Digitization in the German Healthcare Market

The digitization of healthcare is advancing worldwide. The COVID19 pandemic has reinforced the trend while patients increasingly expect and use digital offerings, legislators and providers are scrambling to find solutions to promote and fund digital health solutions. Used correctly, digitization can help achieve four important goals: higher quality of care, greater cost efficiency, an improved patient experience, and an optimized work experience for healthcare staff. Germany has also embarked on the path of digitization: telemedicine, the billing of digital health applications (DiGA), online appointment bookings, electronic patient records (ePA) and e-prescriptions are just a few examples of the digital transformation in the German healthcare system. Nevertheless, not all the potential in this country has been tapped by a long shot. According to a study by McKinsey, the potential benefits of digitization in the German healthcare system have increased significantly in recent years and currently amount to around EUR 42 billion p.a. This is almost a quarter more than the EUR 34 billion in 2018. This noticeable increase is attributable to three influencing factors in total: In the realization of benefits, initial successes have been achieved in recent years, but not yet any drastic ones. The benefits realized are also offset by significantly stronger growth in healthcare spending. In addition, it has become apparent that some technologies promise significantly greater benefits than was assumed in 2018.This paper has examined, from the perspective of gkvi–a large IT service company–what contribution can be made and where the current limits of possible support lie.