GPs to boycott doctor-only medical cards

GPS HAVE no grounds to boycott the 200,000 doctor-only cards which are due to come on stream next month, according to Tánaiste Mary Harney.

The Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) announced yesterday that it will not co-operate with the cards without negotiations with the Department of Health as it has received legal advice that the cards’ introduction will mean a change to their existing medical card contract.

“The IMO’s legal advice is that any such changes will require to be negotiated and agreed with the IMO. We have sought urgent negotiations with the Tánaiste and the Interim Chief Executive of the Health Service Executive (HSE) in respect of the proposed changes,” said IMO GP committee chairman, Dr Martin Daly.

However, a need for contract negotiations has been strongly contested by Ms Harney, who said that talks would centre around “operational matters” and not on rewriting a contract.

She accused the IMO have not helping the doctor card project by not “sitting down with the HSE”.

“The Health Service Executive has approached the IMO on a number of occasions to discuss this, but without success.

“The deputy secretary of the Department of Health wrote to the IMO on March 7 about the new cards. The IMO replied on March 21.

“The Health Service Executive is ready to process the cards. The income guidelines have been agreed. National ads have been prepared. People will be able to apply and the HSE will respond.

“The Government has put everything in place,” Ms Harney added.

Those eligible for the doctor-only care will be single people with a weekly income of not more than €191 and couples earning less than €277.

Following a meeting of the IMO GP committee on Wednesday night, the organisation directed its 2,000 GP members to boycott the scheme.

According to the Tánaiste, the new scheme will cost €50 million a year and all of this money will go to GPs, with the average GP earning €25,000 a year from the doctor-only scheme.

“’I do not accept this is a material change in the GPs’ contract. The capitation rates will be the same. The additional supports to GPs will be calculated on the same basis.

“The only difference for GPs with this new card is that they will fill in prescriptions on a different prescription form to the standard medical card form,” she said.