DiGA are increasingly finding a firm place in the prescribing practice of GPs. Other groups of doctors are also valuing their use more and more. This is the conclusion of an online survey by Stiftung Gesundheit among GPs, specialists, dentists and psychological psychotherapists in private practice, as well as members of non-medical health professions.
One positive finding is that 44.6% of the GPs surveyed say they prescribe DiGA at least occasionally. The share among the psychological psychotherapists surveyed who include DiGA in their patient care at least occasionally is also remarkable at 35.3%.
Among members of non-medical health professions, the group of participating speech therapists stands out: 45.7% say they have already integrated DiGA into everyday treatment.
Survey participants see a major advantage in using them for prevention and screening, closely followed by therapy support. Psychological psychotherapists in particular believe, according to the survey results, in the potential of DiGA especially in aftercare. Members of non-medical health professions would like to be able to prescribe DiGA reimbursably themselves in future: many patients do not take the detour via the doctor’s practice, which means a lot of the potential of DiGA is lost.
The response rate among a total of 23,581 invitations to take part was 8.1%.
You can read all the survey data in the article by Stiftung Gesundheit: https://www.stiftung-gesundheit.de/studien/im-fokus/digitale-gesundheitsanwendungen/