Legal basis for networked support for severely mentally ill people in force

20.12.2021 17:56

A newly designed statutory health insurance offering is intended to improve the care of seriously mentally ill people who require complex medical and therapeutic treatment. The legal requirements for the establishment of the cross-professional network associations intended for this purpose are now in place: The guidelines of the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA), which regulate the content and organizational details of the new assistance offer, came into force on December 18, 2021.

With the entry into force of the directive, the evaluation committee will now also discuss remuneration according to the uniform evaluation standard. He has six months to do this, so that the network associations can probably start working from July 2022.

The G-BA will monitor how the new care concept is received in practice. In the first step, this includes the question of the extent to which network associations are formed and whether there are obstacles to their implementation. In the second step, the G-BA will systematically evaluate whether the goals of the new care concept are being achieved.

Cross-professional network associations

To establish a network, at least ten doctors and psychotherapists sign a network agreement. The disciplines of psychiatry, psychotherapy, psychosomatic medicine and neurology can be represented.

In addition, a network must demonstrate cooperation with at least one inpatient facility and with at least one person from the following health professions via cooperation agreements: occupational therapy, sociotherapy, psychiatric home nursing.

Network agreements and cooperation agreements are examined and approved by the relevant Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KV) if the conditions specified in the G-BA guidelines are met. The KVen provide a public directory of network associations on the Internet.