Zweigapotheke

A Zweigapotheke is a branch operated to keep medicines available in an area where a full pharmacy is not viable. The instrument is older than the reform, and the ApoVWG widens the circumstances in which it can be used.

The December 2025 cabinet draft contained far-reaching provisions on pharmacies operating without a pharmacist present, but those provisions were not included in the statute. What the reform actually offers for thin coverage is the Zweigapotheke, and a Zweigapotheke is still a pharmacy in the ordinary sense.

The difference matters in practice, because the debate held under the heading Telepharmazie was about removing the pharmacist, whereas the Zweigapotheke keeps pharmaceutical supervision and changes the economics of maintaining a site.

For a group already running a Hauptapotheke with Filialapotheken, the reform is therefore an option on coverage instead of an option on staffing. It may make a location workable that previously was not, though it does not reduce the number of pharmacists a group needs.

The conditions attached to the venöse Blutentnahme apply per site and per person, so anyone modelling a branch has to count all four again for that address:

• A suitable private room is needed at the branch site itself.
• Written Standardarbeitsanweisungen have to cover the draw at that site.
• The state authority has to be notified for that site.
• A trained pharmacist has to be actually present for the draw.

The main pharmacy having all four in place does nothing for the branch, which has to meet every one of them itself.

Whether a Zweigapotheke can be operated in a specific location is decided by the competent state authority on the individual case, so the Landesapothekerkammer is the right first contact instead of a general reading of the Apothekenreform.