asked the Minister for Health if any consideration has been given to the provision of financial assistance towards the cost of drugs and medical care incurred by asthmatic patients.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Asthmatic Patients.
5.
Persons suffering from asthma who are covered by medical cards obtain drugs and general practitioner care free of charge.
Persons with limited eligibility are entitled to claim a refund of part of the cost of prescribed medicines so that the net cost of drugs in respect of a calendar month will not exceed £6.50. This particular scheme will be extended to the remainder of the population in April next year.
From that date therefore all asthmatic sufferers who do not have medical cards will be entitled to their drug requirements free to the extent that these exceed £6.50 per month.
Did I understand from the Minister's reply that there is a limit to the covering of expenditure by the asthmatic patient who is entitled to limited eligibility?
Yes. Unless he has a medical card, the person concerned would have recourse to the drugs refund scheme, which refunds anything over £6.50 a month. The person may have to pay up to £1 or £1.50 a month out of his own resources.
It is represented to me that there is heavier expenditure than is normal—if one could use that term—associated with some aids required for asthma, the inhaler and equipment of that sort, for those entitled to limited eligibility. Is any consideration being given to the rather exceptional costs involved for many of these long term patients?
As of now for the limited eligibility category it does not matter and from April next it will not matter how excessive the cost may be; the person concerned will only have to pay a maximum of £6.50 a month. Even at that stage if the person concerned has not got a medical card he could still apply to the chief executive officer of the health board under the hardship provision if the £6.50 a month was too much in his case.
As in relation to coeliac sufferers last week, would the Minister not accept that while that provision may apply, in many cases people have need to get their local GP on a number of occasions during the month and that can involve very heavy costs on families where there is an allergy such as this. Would he consider, as I suggested in relation to coeliacs, that a medical card might be issued solely in relation to the sufferer from the allergy and not in relation to the entire family?
Yes, that is something that can be considered. The usual request in regard to coeliac sufferers and asthma sufferers—the latter particularly—is that they be included in the long term in this scheme. Unfortunately, in regard to asthma sufferers it is difficult to define asthma; it is not a very clearly definable clinical condition.
There is difficulty about the clinics—is the Minister aware of that?