Calls to fast-track training for GPs
TDs have recommended that the number of GP training places be raised to a minimum of 150 per year from the current 120, to meet the growing demand for local treatment.
The cross-party report on expanding the primary care system contains 40 recommendations to help build new centres around the country, including capital tax allowances, stamp duty and rent relief as well aslocal rate relief.
A failure to do this will increase waiting lists and put more pressure on hospital casualty departments, the Committee on Health and Children report warns.
Committee chairman Sean O’Fearghail said the HSE would evaluate centres and care teams in them.
Speaking at the launch though, Health Minister Mary Harney played down any hope of tax relief for the proposals.
The country did not have the resources and occasionally the wrong people had benefited from such relief in the past, she admitted.
However, she accepted the need for more GPs.
“We do have to shorten the training period. We have very restrictive practices that we have to change as well increase the numbers from 120 to 150 [a year].”
The report recommends an increase in the number of college places to study medicine and the expansion of nurse-delivered services for community care. It also calls for pharmacists toexpand their role to include health promotion and screening services.
The full range of primary care services in communities should be available outside of traditional hours, it adds.
The TDs, though, have said large-scale corporateinterests should be excluded from any planned primary care centres.
The number of GP visits is expected to exceed 14.5 million by the year 2021, from the now 12.2 million expected this year. Services such as radiology, ultrasound and cardiac treatment need to be available at the primary care centres, it adds.
Fine Gael TD and committee member James Reilly, also a GP, said: “This is a new concept where people are treated in their surroundings, they feel less threatened and don’t have to go through a large battery of tests in accident and emergency.”
The report looks at how the 2001 Primary Care Strategy is being implemented, the aim of which is to have 95% of health and social care dealt with in the community, rather than hospitals. Up to 32 primary care centres are expected to open this year with another 61 planned over the next two years.
