03/09/2026
For years the paperwork was the hard part, not the medicine.
Germany's health minister, Carsten Linnemann, has put a regulation on the table that tells recognition offices they have to accept documents in English. It also pushes the process online and sets one standard across all 16 states instead of 16 versions of it. It covers doctors, dentists, pharmacists and midwives.
That is the piece that costs applicants money today, because offices have been free to insist on German-language paperwork.
It is not in force yet. The Bundesrat votes on October 16, and the start is planned for November.
There is a second clause in the text. If you began medical or pharmacy training abroad and never finished it, you will be able to complete it here in some cases.
The scale behind the decision: 71,480 doctors working in Germany at the end of 2025 held no German passport. That is 16 percent of all working doctors, roughly double what it was ten years ago, according to the German Medical Association. Germany is heading for a shortfall of about 50,000 doctors by 2040.
Send this to someone whose degree has been sitting in a German office waiting on a translation.
