On December 2, 2022, the German Bundestag passed the Hospital Care Relief Act, which aims to improve the situation for nursing staff in hospitals. The law is still being discussed by the Bundesrat and will come into force the day after it is announced. We explain the significance of this law for us nurses here.

The PPR 2.0 staffing assessment tool is intended to calculate and later enforce ideal staffing levels. The staffing levels are based on the care requirements of the patients. For this purpose, patients are categorized daily by the nursing staff according to their needs in "general care" and "special care" (A 1-4; S 1-4). This grouping is assigned a respective minute value, from which a nursing effort can then be derived. In addition, there are basic care values for each patient and surcharges for isolation requirements. Good documentation is particularly important here to ensure that the classification is comprehensible.

A trial phase will start on January 1, 2023, in which the UMM could also participate. Following this trial phase and its evaluation, the plan is to introduce it across the board in 2024 until staffing levels are finally set and sanctionable in 2025.