Federal Cabinet approves draft of the Nursing Competence Act

19.12.2024 15:14

Expanded powers for nursing professionals, the targeted use of their diverse professional skills in care, and the strengthening of low-threshold local nursing services – these are the central goals of the draft law to strengthen nursing skills, which was passed by the Federal Cabinet on December 18, 2024.

Federal Health Minister Prof. Karl Lauterbach: "Nursing can do more than it has been allowed to do so far. That's why we want to ensure that nurses can better utilize their skills and are more closely involved in care than today. This benefits everyone: Nurses will be valued and motivated in their work, doctors will be relieved, and those in need of care will receive the professional attention they need. Given the increasing need for care in an aging society, we must deploy these skills specifically where they are available and needed."

The provisions of the draft law in detail

• In future, nurses will be employed alongside doctors further services independently than before and be allowed to provide certain healthcare services previously reserved for physicians. Particularly in wound management and the management of diabetes and dementia, but also through follow-up regulations, they should be given more authority and expanded opportunities to make professional decisions regarding medical aids.
• The Nursing Professions Act should clarify that nursing professionals medical tasks may exercise.
• The Tasks of nursing professionals in care should be in a Project described in detail together with the nursing professional organizations (so-called model scope of practice); this description is intended to form the basis for further development steps regarding the legal powers of nursing professionals.
• The Nursing professions organisations at the federal level should be strengthened and be systematically involved in the statutory tasks of Book V and Book XI of the Social Code that affect them. Nursing should be allowed to have a say wherever it is affected.
• The requirements in the area of low-threshold Care and relief services on site should be further developed, made more flexible and debureaucratised.
• The Access to preventive services for those in need of carewho are cared for in home care, is to be improved, among other things through targeted prevention advice or prevention recommendations, which in future can also be given directly by nursing professionals.
• To innovative housing forms close to the neighborhood To promote this, new regulations are to be incorporated into contract law, benefits law, and quality assurance law of long-term care insurance. This will create attractive and legally secure options for operators to be able to provide outpatient nursing care in a variety of new housing forms.
• The Cooperation and exchange of data on the care situation between nursing care funds and municipalities should be improved so that care can be better recorded at the regional level in the future and planned accordingly in line with needs within the framework of municipal care structure planning.
• In the future, municipalities should binding opportunities for participation when licensing care facilities.

There are regulations in Nursing care remuneration law This is intended to enable the parties to the agreement to use more streamlined procedures and speedier conclusions, thus contributing to the timely financing of expenses at nursing facilities. In addition, the reporting and implementation obligations for the provisions on collectively agreed wages are to be extended, and the reporting process for nursing facilities bound by collective agreements is to be simplified to ease their burden.