Health: General practitioners defend telephone sick leave

The General Practitioners Association defends telephone sick leave against criticism from employers. “The introduction of the telephone AU made sense from a medical point of view and is one of the very few successful political measures to debureaucratize the healthcare system so far,” said the co-chair of the association, Nicola Buhlinger-Göpfarth, to the “Rheinische Post”.

Abolishing this now would endanger patient care with numerous infectious diseases in the coming months. “Our practices definitely do not have the capacity to deal with the consequences of any pseudo-solutions from individual politicians,” said the doctor. “We cannot confirm the assumptions that people use the telephone AU to slim their feet from our daily work.”

The option of receiving sick leave by telephone was introduced during the corona pandemic. In December 2023, the Joint Federal Committee of doctors, health insurance companies and clinics decided on a permanent regulation. Patients can then request a sick note by telephone if they are known to the practice and do not have any severe symptoms. As part of its economic growth initiative, the federal government has agreed to review the measure due to increased sickness.

Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) recently said: “In the future, you will have to go to the doctor again to report illness and you won’t be able to just do it over the phone.” He doesn’t want to accuse anyone of exploiting the regulation. Unfortunately, there is “a correlation between the annual sickness rate in Germany and the introduction of the measure, which was intended as a good reduction in bureaucracy.” The Federal Association of Employers (BDA) is also calling for the telephone AU to be abolished. “Let’s go back to the tried and tested procedure,” said BDA general manager Steffen Kampeter to the “Rheinische Post”.