[Round-table-talk on patient education in rheumatology]

Primarily the discussion group focused on obtaining current information about the existing patient education programs for different rheumatic diseases developed by a working group of the German Society of Rheumatology, about the institutions running the patient education courses, the train-the-trainer seminars, the costs and the problems of fund raising from the health insurance companies. As a successful example for running patient education courses in an outpatient setting, the cooperation between the Arthritis Center of Hannover and the League against Rheumatism in Lower Saxony was illustrated. Then the group defined three important future tasks: to reach a standard of funding patient education by every health insurance company in Germany, to increase the efforts to inform the public about patient education and to establish a nation-wide network of patient education centers. A meeting of all Collaborative Arthritis Centers in Germany was proposed to discuss the necessary steps to reach these aims.