Language examinations for foreign doctors

Health ministers discuss the introduction of language examinations for foreign doctors

06/27/2014

The health ministers of the federal and state governments have announced today to present the results of their two-day consultations in Hamburg. Topics included demographic change and its challenges to the healthcare system, as well as the language skills of foreign physicians.

Number of foreign doctors working in Germany is increasing
Hamburg's Senator Cornelia Prüfer-Storcks (SPD), chair of the Health Ministers Conference, called for standardized reviews of the language skills of foreign physicians prior to the event. According to data from the German Medical Association, more than 31,000 physicians from abroad worked in Germany at the end of last year. This corresponds to an increase of ten percent compared to the previous year. In particular, the number of medical professionals from Greece, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Syria has risen.

In the face of demographic change, another focus of the conference was the challenges facing the health system in terms of the aging of society. Prüfer-Storcks called for better provision of services, in particular for rural areas, including technical assistance and telematic applications. These could also provide access to highly specialized medicine in remote locations. As further measures would come healthhouses and „rolling doctor's offices“ in question.