David Cullinane
Question:1861. Deputy David Cullinane asked the Minister for Health the breakdown of the additional funding allocated in Budget 2021 to general practitioner diagnostics; and the way in which it was spent. [35661/21]
View answerTuesday, 27 July 2021
Questions (1861)
Written answers
In Budget 2021, significant investment of €25m was allocated to implement a programme of structured access to diagnostics services for GPs. The aim of this initiative is to address the situation whereby patients can be inappropriately referred to hospital Emergency or Outpatient Departments to access diagnostics, thus exacerbating ED overcrowding or necessitating excessive waiting times for patients to access the required scans.
The GP Access to Diagnostics Scheme was successfully launched in January of this year. As of the most recently available data from the HSE in early May, there had been a total of 22,051 scans of various modalities provided. Almost 70% of these were MRI scans, over 16% were X-Rays, just over 9% were CT scans and slightly over 4% were DEXA scans.
The very latest information on the scheme is unfortunately not available due to the ongoing effects of the recent cyber-attack on the HSE’s ICT systems. However, the number of scans and tests which have been provided at this date can be expected to be significantly higher than the May figures, particularly as the service is currently available to the full population.