About the Health and Social Compass

for the municipality of Lörrach

The Digital Health and Social Compass is an innovative online platform that helps citizens in the county find appropriate health and social information and offers. The aim is to create a transparent, easily accessible and networked solution for the existence of the digital age and to relieve them in the supply context.

For the implementation, the Health Department and the Social Department have joined forces in an innovative, cross-departmental SCRUM project group. Through a project group of the Municipal Care Conference with the association partners Diakonie and Seniorenakademie, the promotion of digital literacy also enables older and older people with low technology affinity and people with participation barriers to use the digital compass. The project group was awarded the prize “Kommunal.Digital.Genial”.

The project will be supported by the Fritz Berger Foundation until 2027. The purpose of the Fritz Berger Foundation is to provide assistance to elderly and disabled people in the city of Lörrach and in the district of Lörrach. The project received further support in the start-up phase from the AOK Hochrhein-Bodensee and the municipal care conference of the district.

What is it about?

In the Lörrach district, the challenges of health and social affairs are becoming increasingly noticeable: more and more domestic medical seats remain unoccupied, the population ages, and particularly mobility-restricted or socially disadvantaged people have increasingly difficulties finding suitable medical, nursing or social offers.

At the same time, it shows that many people find it difficult to find, understand, evaluate and apply health and social information in their everyday lives. According to studies (Federal Ministry of Health, 2024), more than half of the population has low health literacy, which not only leads to uncertainty, but also puts an additional burden on the care system.

Against this background, there has been a lack of a central, low-threshold and accessible digital point of contact that provides comprehensible information, provides orientation and meaningfully links existing offers. The need for such a platform was also confirmed by a citizen survey in the district. A central starting point was the funding project “Healthy in the district of Lörrach – future-proof care – network project primary care” (2022–2024), which highlighted the need for a central contact point for medical and social services in the district.

This is our goal

  • With the health and social compass, we want to make health and social services more transparent and easier accessible to citizens.

  • The health and social compass promotes health competence and helps citizens find reliable information, understand and make informed decisions for their health.

  • The platform not only provides information, but also promotes the networking of providers and users.

  • The bundled provision of health and social services makes available resources used in a targeted manner to make the supply more accessible and more appropriate for all needs.

  • The platform supports citizens in clarifying simple concerns independently and thus helps to relieve healthcare.

  • The health and social compass is inclusive, multilingual and easy to understand, allowing all people to access important information regardless of individual restrictions.

  • The platform is future-proof and can be flexibly expanded and complemented by technical and content.

  • The project is developed in close cooperation with specialist areas, institutions, suppliers and beneficiaries.

  • Data protection has the highest priority – all sensitive data are processed and stored safely.

  • The health and social compass is not an all-encompassing solution but a building block within the medical care in the district of Lörrach.