Healthcare has always had its share of chronic conditions, but not all of them are clinical.

For years healthcare communications have been trapped in paper-based systems, slow email chains and endless telephone tag. More worrying still, the creeping adoption of consumer-grade chat apps is now putting private patient data directly into Big Tech's hands - whose entire business models depend on harvesting it.

Now there’s a prescription for change.

CompuGroup Medical (CGM) – one of the world’s leading e-health companies – and Element are partnering to transform how healthcare professionals exchange information securely in real time.

Healthcare organisations need to exchange information quickly and securely, while maintaining strict control over sensitive patient data. Traditional centralised messaging platforms don’t match those requirements. They create vendor lock-in, fragment communication across organisational boundaries, and leave healthcare bodies dependent on a single commercial provider for infrastructure they can't fully inspect or control. That challenge is only growing as governments and public sector organisations across Europe place increasing weight on digital sovereignty. 

By combining CGM’s deep medical sector expertise with Element’s communications technology, we’re building tailored tools that provide sovereign, interoperable and secure communications for healthcare.

Supporting CGM’s healthcare messaging platforms

CGM has developed two powerful messaging solutions, CGM TI-Messenger and the CGM Messenger, both built on the Matrix open standard.

CGM TI-Messenger: The recently launched CGM TI-Messenger, certified by gematik (Germany’s national digital health agency), enables Germany’s healthcare professionals and organisations to exchange information securely and in real time as an alternative to email and phone-based workflows.

The TI-Messenger initiative is transforming German healthcare’s traditional systems, and puts patient privacy first. It serves as a powerful real-world blueprint for interoperable, sovereign communications by creating a massive nationwide private federation that will connect more than 150,000 separate healthcare organisations.

CGM Messenger: CGM Messenger (built on Matrix, rather than Germany’s Matrix-based TI-Messenger standard) brings the same standard of secure, real time collaboration for use outside of Germany’s TI-Messenger infrastructure. 

Designed for global adaptability, it connects disparate healthcare teams, clinics, and administrative staff by embedding sovereign and end-to-end encrypted messaging directly into existing healthcare IT systems. CGM and Element are establishing a new global benchmark for safe, efficient, and interconnected digital health ecosystems.

Matrix is a game changer for healthcare

The Matrix open standard provides fundamental benefits for healthcare communications:

• Digital sovereignty: Every healthcare organisation retains total ownership and control of its own data.
• Seamless interoperability: Separate hospitals, clinics, and labs can connect and talk to each other instantly, even if they use Matrix-based products from different vendors - making Matrix the ideal way to connect thousands of separate organisations.
• Competitive ecosystem: Because the standard is completely open, it supports a competitive ecosystem of vendors, which naturally drives freedom of choice and rapid industry innovation.
• Powerful security: End-to-end encryption and layered security protections ensure sensitive patient data stays confidential.
• Beyond chat: Matrix-based communication can be embedded directly into software, medical machinery and the Internet of Things (IoT) to transmit patient data instantly and securely.

As Jens-Uwe Thieme, General Manager Patient Portal & Platform Components at CGM, puts it:

Powered by Element Server Suite Pro

This partnership is powered by Element Server Suite Pro (ESS Pro), our enterprise-grade Matrix infrastructure platform.

Healthcare organisations need communication systems that are not only secure, but also scalable, resilient, and maintainable over the long term. ESS Pro is designed to meet those requirements while supporting the evolving standards around Matrix and TI-Messenger compliance.

ESS Pro supports both single-tenant and multi-tenant deployments, including configurations specifically designed for TI-Messenger environments. Its multi-tenant architecture for TI-Messenger was recently security validated by gematik.

It also provides enterprise capabilities, including:

• Long-term support aligned with Matrix and TI-Messenger standards
• Identity and access management
• Advanced administration and auditing tools
• Security notifications
• Auto-scaling infrastructure to handle changing traffic demands
• Multi-tenant ‘small hosts’ capability

For us, this partnership reflects a broader shift happening across healthcare and the public sector.

Organisations increasingly want a communication infrastructure that is open, sovereign, interoperable, and secure by design - without compromising usability for healthcare professionals.

We believe Matrix is uniquely positioned to support that future, and CGM is exactly the kind of partner to help us build it.