Tanaiste calls on doctors to reduce their charges

Traumadoc · 02-11-2008 5:45pm

No we are around the same vintage, I got all my overtime (3.75 x200 = 750 then take 48% tax and you get 380 pounds).

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 10:57am

jaycen wrote: »

Fair play to her but I don't think it will have any effect on the moneygrabbing doctors;
€50 for a GP visit that probably lasts 15 mins, there should be a law against rates like that, in any other profession price fixing like that wouldn't be tolerated.

Its not price fixing, that is a gP setting a rate for their services

Price fixing would be when all gps come together and agree that they will charge the same fee for everything

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:02am

inforfun wrote: »

To be perfectly honest, i wouldnt like anyone who is up for 70 hours to make a life/death decision on me.

50 or 60 euro is an awfull lot to see a doctor for 10 minutes in order to walk out with a recipe for yet another antibiotics cure.

I live in ireland for 7 years now but i have seen more people on antibiotics in those 7 years than in 30+ years in my own country (the Netherlands).
What is up with that?

I think people need to put all this in context

I bought a house a number of years ago, £3,500 was the fee at the time for legal stuff charged as a percentage of the cost of the house. A family member is now a lawyer and explained how much (little ) work there was involved in doing this but it was a service I required and had to pay for it

Many people have bought houses since, I doubt if they added up what they have paid in medical fees to GPs (NOT WHAT THEY PAY ANNUALLY TO MEDICAL INSURANCE COMPANIES) they will not have come anywhere near the fees they have paid to legal people for their houses and yet most people pay the solicitor, walk away happy, the GP charges a fraction for making potentially life and death decisions and id being castigated

I am not a GP but we need to put things in perspective here

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:08am

inforfun wrote: »

The slave remark reminds me a bit of a certain c. ronaldo a few months back. When earning 150k a year i wouldnt call it exactly slavery.

But apart from that, the answer is clear to me.
Thanks.

Could it also have to do with this (and i am looking to my own situation)
My employer demands that anybody who is off sick for 3 days goes to his/her GP and gets a cert.
That is where my problem is.... i dont need to pay 50 or 60 to a GP to hear that i got a cold. I know damn well myself when i got a cold or not.
Do people maybe look for anything they can get from a GP (antibiotics most of all) in order to show their employers they are off sick for a ligitimate reason?

This brings up my own personal bugbear, i did not go into medicine to write notes on a constant basis in casualty because a business down the road sends all its workers up for notes to declare they are not fit for work

People need to direct themselves towards their management in this circumstance and get their unions on board, if employers want such notes than they should have occupational medicine services, provided at employers costs

I get really annoyed when parents get sent from school to casualty for notes related to childrens absences.
The PARENTS are the persons responsible for their children not me
The SCHOOLS liaise with the parents regarding everything else to do with teh childs schooling

Why is the parents word not ggod enough in their own handwriting that the child is not able to go to school, that would reduce a lot of work for casualty departments and for GPS

norrie rugger · 09-04-2009 11:09am

tallaght01 wrote: »

http://www.independent.ie/breaking-news/national-news/tanaiste-calls-on-doctors-to-reduce-their-charges-1502090.html

So, what do people reckon?

Should lawyers take less cash to prop up the crappy legal aid system?

Should junior doctors and nurses take less money so the government can improve the crappy hospital system?

Or is coughlan justified in what she's asking for?

My opnion: It's a crock of balls. She's paying private contracters. If you want to dictate how much private business people charge, then emply them.
Emply docs to work for the state, and provide free-at-the-point-of-entry care to the old, the less well-off and the very young via salaried public doctors.
Just my 2c though.

Every company is allowed to pay as little as they can, to contractors. Why should a government be any different?
I might lose my job, or have to take a pay cut, why should doctors not take some pain. I'm sorry but if everyone else has to feel pain, then doctors should not be exempt

*edit* just saw how old this is *edit*
Point still stands though, at the moment the price of services is dropping everywhere. Doctors and Solicitors should be no different

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:12am

sam34 wrote: »

other professionals do charge just as much, as someone else has pointed out...

i paid a solicitor €80 to witness my signature on a document before i moved jobs in the HSE within the same province. took approx 30 seconds, solicitor did not know me, nor ask for id.

i paid my dentist €65 for a check up which took less than 10 mins. no clean&polish, no frills, just a check up.
i paid my hairdresser €90 last wk for 2 hrs work... i dont earn that.
i paid a locksmith €70 for a ten minute job
i paid a driving instructor €35 for an hour, at a time when i was not earning that myself
the list is endless

I paid a plumber/electrician £80 call out, £65 labour £25 parts to fix a washing machine, couldnt do it myself (19 year old guy)

Found out I was a doctor and wanted me to look at his throat while he was there, had a temp, had pussy enlarged tonsils, gave him pain killers, antiseptic mouthwash and 5 days of antibiotics which I had

He wanted cash from me, explained didnt have that sort of cash, didnt expect charges would be so high, reluctantly he agreed to take cheque

Gave him a cheque for £90 and a receipt for £80 for my services

He started to argue then realised he had a good deal, pain gone had his medications didnt need to take more time off work and went on his way

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:16am

Tim Robbins wrote: »

Isn't there a test though that can be done on saliva to determine whether it is bacterial or viral? It can be done in an instant and is done in Sweden?

YES can be done
costs about €15 if bought in bulk, results in an hour I think with respect to whether you have a viral upper respiratory tract infection

Begs the question who will pay, HSE will not pay for the test form medical card patients even though it would be best for the state in the long run,

GP wont pay as two of those in a year and they are losing money on a medical card patient (possibly even after the first one depending on the capitation) Would cut out a lot of prescriptions save money that way

asdasd · 09-04-2009 11:17am

A family member is now a lawyer and explained how much (little ) work there was involved in doing this but it was a service I required and had to pay for it

All we have established here is that there is more than one professional cartel in ireland.

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:20am

norrie rugger wrote: »

Every company is allowed to pay as little as they can, to contractors. Why should a government be any different?
I might lose my job, or have to take a pay cut, why should doctors not take some pain. I'm sorry but if everyone else has to feel pain, then doctors should not be exempt

*edit* just saw how old this is *edit*
Point still stands though, at the moment the price of services is dropping everywhere. Doctors and Solicitors should be no different

Sorry Norrie think you missed the original old point

They are asking Doctors to cut their fees to the person in front of them ie telling doctors they should charge less for the services they are offering

Has nothing to do with what the HSE or DOH are willing to pay for services

And by the way doctors lose jobs too, junior doctors face major slash in their payrates where 1st 10 hours of overtime will be at standard rate ie not overtime at all.

Thats fine if you have a choice and can say sorry I dont need the money give the overtime to someone else but they are not allowed to do that by contract

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:21am

asdasd wrote: »

All we have established here is that there is more than one professional cartel in ireland.

Sorry that was not my point if you read further

The fees paid to solictors would be well in excess of what I have spent in last 10 years on GP fees for me wife and 3 children and yes like everyone else I do pay GP fees even though am a doctor. I do get to see same GP each time and probably get a little longer with him but I pay my way

drzhivago · 09-04-2009 11:24am

asdasd wrote: »

All we have established here is that there is more than one professional cartel in ireland.

A cartel is a formal (explicit) agreement among firms. It is a formal organization of producers that agree to coordinate prices and production. [1] Cartels usually occur in an oligopolistic industry, where there is a small number of sellers and usually involve homogeneous products. Cartel members may agree on such matters as price fixing, total industry output, market shares, allocation of customers, allocation of territories, bid rigging, establishment of common sales agencies, and the division of profits or combination of these. The aim of such collusion is to increase individual members' profits by reducing competition. Competition laws forbid cartels. Identifying and breaking up cartels is an important part of the competition policy in most countries, although proving the existence of a cartel is rarely easy, as firms are usually not so careless as to put agreements to collude on paper.

Based on that definition I dont think in any way GP services could be decribed as a cartel in Ireland

Fees vary
Opening hours vary
Numbers of GPS per area vary
Services offered by GPS vary

norrie rugger · 09-04-2009 11:34am

drzhivago wrote: »

Sorry Norrie think you missed the original old point

They are asking Doctors to cut their fees to the person in front of them ie telling doctors they should charge less for the services they are offering

Has nothing to do with what the HSE or DOH are willing to pay for services

And by the way doctors lose jobs too, junior doctors face major slash in their payrates where 1st 10 hours of overtime will be at standard rate ie not overtime at all.

Thats fine if you have a choice and can say sorry I dont need the money give the overtime to someone else but they are not allowed to do that by contract

What they are doing to J.Docs is wrong.

The edit i threw in there was because I had missed the date (and context) of the original thread.

I still think that GP's/Solicitors/Other "Higher" professionals need to take as much of a hit as the rest of the workforce.
Many providing services are slashing their rates, my mechanic did a job for me yesterday at parts only price bacause "I should have spotted that, the last time you were in"

ergo · 09-04-2009 5:34pm

norrie rugger wrote: »

What they are doing to J.Docs is wrong.

The edit i threw in there was because I had missed the date (and context) of the original thread.

I still think that GP's/Solicitors/Other "Higher" professionals need to take as much of a hit as the rest of the workforce.

they are taking the hit......do you know how many unemployed solicitors are out there, those who previously spent an awful lot of time on work related to house/property deals

regarding GP fees coming down, well if the HSE is cutting funding to general practice (and I don't know the latest, am far away from it where I am right now, but if funding is cut by say 8-16%, well, the GP still has to pay the same staff, same overheads, rents unlikely to have come down that much as yet, I'm not sure cutting consultation fees wiill be an option as yet

and that cut doesn't take into account the big hit some practices took with the reduction in fee for over 70's cards

this quote here from the Irish Medical Time sin March

"The IMO fears that Government plans involve more than just a cut in doctors’ medical card capitation fees. There may also be a cut in GMS allowances – for nursing, secretarial and other support – which could double the expected eight per cent income cuts for medical practices. The IMO will set out its position on the cuts and other ideas that have been floated by the Government in the run-up to the Budget on April 2.

“The doctor may not be in a position to pass on a cut in allowances for contracted staff,” said Dr Ronan Boland, IMO GP Chair. “The overhead would remain the same, even though the allowance to support it might be cut by eight per cent.” The cut in income will depend on the overhead mix of the practice. Overheads vary from practice to practice, depending particularly on staffing levels and the cost of premises, but they will typically fall within a range of 35-50 per cent of practice income. At a rate of 50 per cent, the drop in income to the practice could be as high as 16 per cent."

norrie rugger wrote: »

Many providing services are slashing their rates, my mechanic did a job for me yesterday at parts only price bacause "I should have spotted that, the last time you were in"

you would expect that from a mechanic whether in the midst of a flourishing economy or in the depths of a recession (if they missed something they shouldn't have)

haemfire · 09-04-2009 7:15pm

a doctor that is sevens years a SPR gets payed less that what a garage charges for a mechanics time.

think about your GP charges and your hairstylist charges

DrIndy · 09-04-2009 10:15pm

haemfire wrote: »

a doctor that is sevens years a SPR gets payed less that what a garage charges for a mechanics time.

think about your GP charges and your hairstylist charges

I think it comes down to perception.

You have to go to a doctor because you are sick, you leave still sick and miserable and with time you get better.

Versus:

You choose which hairdresser you go to, you look cool afterwards, people comment on how nice you look and you feel happy.

No-one says you look really cool because you go to your doctor all the time.

This can generate resentment. Dentists are less so affected - people have shiny, painless teeth afterwards and get an immediate response.

JuliusCaesar · 10-04-2009 1:20pm

haemfire wrote: »

think about your GP charges and your hairstylist charges

One of the Psychologist magazines once suggested that a private practice psychologist should charge double the rate charged by a local hairdresser for a ladies wash, cut & blow-dry. Overheads lower for a psychologist obviously.

I don't begrudge paying my GP. There's no way I'd want his job. 10 minutes per patient, earn enough to support self and family, also to employ receptionist, practice nurse, accountant, bookkeeper, out-of-hours cover, pay for equipment, keep up to date - take a day off for CPD and it's a day's pay lost.......It's a wonder they don't charge more.

AmcD · 12-04-2009 12:08pm

DrIndy wrote: »

I think it comes down to perception.

You have to go to a doctor because you are sick, you leave still sick and miserable and with time you get better.

Versus:

You choose which hairdresser you go to, you look cool afterwards, people comment on how nice you look and you feel happy.

No-one says you look really cool because you go to your doctor all the time.

This can generate resentment. Dentists are less so affected - people have shiny, painless teeth afterwards and get an immediate response.

This is a good spin on an old argument. The bottom line is that people simply don't like paying for their health. But even if the the health service was completely free, like the NHS, there would still be drawbacks. For example you would be unlikely to see the GP of your choice on the same day you requested an appointment- if the service is free is gets used a lot.

Tanaiste calls on doctors to reduce their charges

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