[State of efficient research on secondary health data in the German health data lab]

The Health Data Lab (Forschungsdatenzentrum, FDZ) is responsible for making anonymized claims data from all statutory health insurance beneficiaries in Germany available to research. These data provide longitudinal information on the healthcare of a large part of the German population, and making it available for secondary use in research and development is a legally enshrined goal. The technological basis is subject to a continuous development process, which repeatedly offers the opportunity to address the evolving needs and requirements of authorized users. The present assessment aims to contribute to the identification and classification of these needs and requirements. The findings obtained from semi-structured interviews with authorized users are formulated as recommendations for the further development of the FDZ.