Louise O'Reilly
Question:188. Deputy Louise O'Reilly asked the Minister for Health the estimated cost of directly employing one, ten and 50 general practitioners, respectively, inclusive of salary and PRSI costs. [27338/19]
View answerThursday, 27 June 2019
Questions (188)
Written answers
General Practitioners (GPs) are not employees of the HSE but are private practitioners contracted to provide services on behalf of the HSE, to people with Medical Cards, GP Visit Cards and various other schemes.
Under the General Medical Services (GMS) contract, GPs are reimbursed for a range of services they provide to medical card and GP visit card holders. GPs are remunerated for these services primarily on a capitation basis, with a range of additional support payments and fees for specific items of service.
As the HSE does not directly hire GPs and currently there is no approved salary scale in the public service for a GP post, it is not possible to quantify the financial implications for the HSE of additional GPs being hired to provide services to the public health system under the GMS and other schemes.