Vol. 556 No. 3
566 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for Health and Children if his Department is involved in an exercise which is likely to see the tens of thousands of medical cards for the over 70s removed from the scheme; and the way in which this will impact on GMS doctors. [20568/02]
568 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for Health and Children if he will make a statement on a recent article in a journal (details supplied) of 11 October 2002 that, as a result of an examination by his Department, it was found that 14,100 medical cards out of over 70,000 should not exist due to the fact that people have died or have moved away. [20570/02]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 566 and 568 together.
The Government decision to extend automatic medical card eligibility to all persons aged 70 and over with effect from 1 July 2001 was announced on budget day in December 2000. The measure was subsequently unanimously approved by this House. It was originally estimated that 39,000 persons would benefit from the initiative. This was based on the CSO estimate of persons aged 70 and over in the State less the number in that age category already registered as medical cardholders.
However, it subsequently came to light that the health board-GMS databases of medical cardholders in the over 70s age category were inaccurate. Following a targeted review by health boards of medical card lists for the over 70s, in excess of 15,200 duplicate entries and entries for deceased persons have so far been removed from those lists. My Department has now requested the chief executive officers of the health boards to arrange for an immediate full review of the entire GMS list for their functional areas, to be completed by the end of the year. They have also been requested to put in place an effective pro-active management system so as to ensure that the lists are accurate in the future.
The effect of this cleansing exercise on participating GMS doctors will be to cease inappropriate payments to them in respect of patients for whom they no longer have responsibility. Following the completion of the comprehensive cleansing exercise mentioned above I will also be putting arrangements in place to recover moneys which have been paid to doctors in error.
