The most important skill in digital public health? It's not AI.

As the healthcare system becomes digitized, the skill requirements for public health professionals are shifting. However, digital public health has so far been taught inconsistently in German degree programs due to the lack of a common curricular framework.

Together with colleagues from the German Society for Public Health, we have addressed precisely this gap. In a three-stage Delphi study, experts from academia, government, and the field assessed the relevance of potential course content. A total of 80 agreed-upon core topics spanning eleven public health subject areas reflect the high degree of heterogeneity. 

The highest priority was not given to topics such as AI and big data, but rather to practical competencies such as participatory, user-centered approaches or the development and evaluation of digital interventions. In other words, the competencies that determine the actual effectiveness of digital offerings. The fact that the results align with international frameworks (ASPHER, WHO) makes them applicable beyond Germany’s borders.

This provides, for the first time, a consensus-based foundation that degree programs can use to guide the (further) development of their curricula—a step toward harmonizing digital public health education and preparing the next generation for a digitally transformed healthcare system.

“Digitalization in healthcare does not succeed through technology alone, but through the people who shape and use it. Crucial for future education is, above all, the combination of methodological foundations, ethical reflection, and participatory design of digital health solutions. This is exactly what we must prepare the next generation for.” Dr. Joanna Albrecht, postdoc at the Chair of Digital Public Health

Participants from our department: Joanna Albrecht, Pinar Tokgöz, and Anna Lea Stark-Blomeier.