A pharmazeutische Dienstleistung, abbreviated pDL, is a service a pharmacy provides beyond dispensing, regulated in § 129 Absatz 5e Sozialgesetzbuch V and financed from its own pot rather than from the margin on a pack.
Before the ApoVWG the catalogue was purely contractual. The reform names ten services directly in statute. They include counselling with risk-adapted measurement of risk factors such as blood values and blood pressure, brief-intervention counselling on tobacco-related illness, the erweiterte Medikationsberatung bei Polymedikation, Medikationsmanagement for complex and for newly prescribed long-term medication, care for transplant patients and for patients on oral antitumour therapy, extended instruction in inhalation and injection technique, and standardised risk assessment for high blood pressure.
Three changes sit alongside the list. A doctor can now prescribe a pDL. For the two Medikationsmanagement services the pharmacy has to coordinate with the treating physician beforehand. Results have to reach the elektronische Patientenakte once that is technically possible.
The first item is the commercially interesting one, because a counselling service built on measured blood values puts diagnostics at the centre of the catalogue. Billing to the health insurers begins on 1 January 2027 and the remuneration is still being negotiated, with a deadline of 1 November 2026 before the Schiedsstelle decides.
A pDL is not the same as an apothekenübliche Dienstleistung paid for privately.
This glossary entry is general information about German pharmacy law and practice. It is not legal advice. For binding guidance on your own pharmacy, contact your Landesapothekerkammer.
