Judge calls for controls on medical card prescription pads
Pads could not be accounted for when they went missing or were taken, Judge Ray Fullam heard at a sitting in Tralee, Co Kerry, which was told how two elderly ladies had been doubly prescribed in January 2009. Neither doctor knew the patients were attending the other doctor.
“Overall control of GMS pads seems to be very loose, given the evidence of this case, and it is a matter for the authorities to improve the system,” said Judge Fullam.
There was evidence that Dr Maria Gordos, a former employee of Waterville husband-and-wife team Dr Patricia Gibson and Dr Derry Gibson, had continued to issue prescriptions to medical card patients after she had left on June 25, 2008.
Dr Gordos of Carhan, Cahirciveen, a Hungarian doctor specialising in paediatrics who now practices in Killarney, is bringing an unfair dismissal case against the Gibsons, the court also heard.
Dr Patricia Gibson said they had copies of 39 prescriptions issued by Dr Gordos to GMS patients registered with their practice which they obtained from pharmacists in Sneem and Cahirciveen up to January 2009, but had no way of knowing how many others had been issued or if they continued to be issued.
The Gibsons had become concerned after discovering patients on psychiatric drugs or sleeping tablets risked being doubly prescribed. Dr Patricia Gibson said there was a risk of overdosing, or inter-reaction, citing the case of two elderly ladies being prescribed sleeping pills by Dr Gordos, when the Gibsons had already prescribed other psychiatric medicines.
Dr Gordos was perfectly entitled to issue prescriptions privately, but would have to be registered as a GP to prescribe on the medical card scheme. While Dr Gordos was in the practice she was entitled to these prescriptions but not when she left, Dr Gibson stated.
Judge Fullam made an order restraining Dr Gordos from using the Gibsons’ prescription pads.
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