Minister of Health Lauterbach sees it in a similar way to the representatives of general practitioners and panel doctors: sometimes a call for sick leave can be better than going to the practice. He lets it be known that the decision to return to sick leave by telephone will be made soon.
Federal Minister of Health Lauterbach believes that the return to telephone sick leave called for by medical representatives is correct and supports it. It should be decided soon, preliminary talks were underway, the SPD politician shared his knowledge on Twitter. "With the high number of Covid cases, we don't need to carry the infections to the practice," says Lauterbach.
The chairman of the German Association of General Practitioners, Ulrich Weigeldt, had called it "a real nuisance" in view of the numerous cases of colds and corona diseases that the possibility of determining incapacity for work (AU) by telephone had not been included in standard care. "The telephone AU would provide real relief," says Weigeldt. Lauterbach shared an article with Weigeldt's classification in his tweet.
Since June 1st, patients have had to go back to the practice or to a video consultation for sick leave. In the case of mild illnesses of the upper respiratory tract, during the corona pandemic until May 31st, this was possible for up to seven days even after only a telephone consultation.
Such regulations are decided by the Federal Joint Committee on Health Care (G-BA). The committee is made up of representatives of the medical profession, health insurance companies and hospitals and decides on the services of the statutory health insurance funds and rules such as sick leave.
The deputy chairman of the board of directors of the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KBV), Stephan Hofmeister, had also said: "We want to make it possible for the resident doctors to be able to write sick patients over the phone, regardless of the corona pandemic."
According to a G-BA spokeswoman, it is possible to return to the option of taking sick leave by telephone. In the spring, there was an intensive discussion in the committee "whether it is right to let the previous special regulations for telephone sick leave expire at the end of May 2022," she said. All sponsors of the G-BA and thus also the KBV as the representative of the medical profession agreed at the time that such special rules could be withdrawn because of the calmer pandemic situation at the time. This was done in line with everyday relaxation. "Should the corona pandemic pick up speed again, the Federal Joint Committee can activate its special regulations (...) again," said the spokeswoman.
