Average Irish GP wage

medicinegirl

Hi all

Long time reader-first time poster!

I'm a mature student heading into final med in one of the Dublin med schools.
I've a big interest in doing General Practice and have done several voluntary electives in it-from this experience, I'm convinced it's the job for me.

I was hoping somebody here might be able to help me with a query. Myself and my fiancee are looking into getting a mortgage and I was looking for figures somewhere to indicate the average Irish GP wage. It's just for myself really as I know the banks are likely to give us a mortgage if I'm going to be a doctor and he's a solicitor. I just don't want to get in over my head and realise 8 years down the line that I'm not making anywhere near the kind of money I thought I'd be making. Also I have a loan of massive proportions hanging over me and would like some idea of how long it'll take me to clear it!

I know that for the training years, I'd be making the same as any other SHO based in a hospital but it's really more for after that I was wondering what the average salary was. I'd be interested in what an assistant makes and what a partner makes (though I know that's years down the line!)

I've tried to find this info online and am really getting nowhere so any advice would be very much appreciated!!

Thanks!

medicinegirl

I'm sure you'll be surprised to hear I didn't find that particularly funny but I really hope you did and laughed away all on your own


If anyone has any useful comments on this, I'd really appreciate it-feel free to PM me if you'd prefer not to post on here

Thanks

anotherlostie

Personally I don't think you can make any type of prediction based on what will be the situation in 8 years time. Look at the pharmacists for instance. Salaries are predicted to be less than half what they were 2 years ago if the current changes go through, and a lot of pharmacies may have to close. I bet there are a lot of mortgages that were taken out under very different projections.

The Bord Snip report mentions tendering for GMS services (based on price) and that may equally leave GP's in a very different place with regard to salary by the time you would be entering the market.

Good luck if someone is willing to advise on a figure.

sam34

haemfire wrote: »

if fairness medicinegirl, give credit where credits due!! doctor evil talkin about money and you are a med student wondering if your will make enough bucketfulls of money as a gp, while your trying to convey an alturistic image of you and your solicitor bf living in some alleyway!!!

:rolleyes:

god forbid someone would want to have a projected estimate of future earnings so that they can make responsible financial decisions.

if everyone had done that then maybe we wouldnt be in the perilous ecomonic situation we are in presently.

she has tried get the information already, but could not do so, so is asking people in a similar position to give her an indication of earnings.

nothing unreasonable or money-grabbing there, imo.

Boethius

haemfire wrote: »

if fairness medicinegirl, give credit where credits due!! doctor evil talkin about money and you are a med student wondering if your will make enough bucketfulls of money as a gp, while your trying to convey an alturistic image of you and your solicitor bf living in some alleyway!!!

Where did she try to convey any image of herself and her boyfriend , anyone else sense a little bitterness towards GP's or solicitors or both maybe?

OP, I think if you look at the UK it's pretty easy to get figures which average out around about 100k a year for GP's of all grades but you could try the IMO and they might be able to help you out in some way...

tallaght01

haemfire, if you post anything at all in this thread again you will be banned, or if you try and take the piss with another user again.

I've cleaned up the thread to get rid of the nonsense, and the people who quite rightly told haemfire that he was talking nonsense.

Sorry about that, medicinegrl. That' not how most people act on the forum.

We have a few GPs on here. BUt I think it will be tough to get a meaningful "average"

Pete4779

~ €120k in an established practice, but TBH it's all becoming privatised, so get into the mindset of running a business and not relying on public income. Calculate office, staff, etc., costs. What has happened in the UK and US is happening here already. YOu could make €250k year if you treat as a business as many UK GPs do, or else rely on contracts, etc., and how many hours you do per day. The world is yours; you can make €50k and barely break even on 3 days a week, or you can pull in hundreds a day and run a small ops clinic with 3-4 practitioners and do botox, etc., . Don't expect a government supplied level of income and instead expect to generate your own income - it's the future here.

medicinegirl

Thanks tallaght01 for tidying up

Cheers to everybody for the comments-really appreciate it.

I actually had a PM and email from one of the board users which was really useful and helpful so that really cleared things up for me

Thanks all!

tallaght01

Glad u got sorted. And don't be a stranger

NickCarraway

medicinegirl wrote: »

Thanks tallaght01 for tidying up

Cheers to everybody for the comments-really appreciate it.

I actually had a PM and email from one of the board users which was really useful and helpful so that really cleared things up for me

Thanks all!

Hey any chance i could get my hands on that info, either from you medicinegirl or the person who sent it to you?
I also have a personal interest in this.

travellers

You can always check the following websites:

http://www.payscale.com/research/IE/Country=Ireland/Salary

or

www.careerjet.ie

and just look for positions as GP/Doctor

RobFowl

NickCarraway wrote: »

Hey any chance i could get my hands on that info, either from you medicinegirl or the person who sent it to you?
I also have a personal interest in this.

Whats the interest ?

2Scoops

RobFowl wrote: »

Whats the interest ?

4.7% p.a. :pac:

RobFowl

2Scoops wrote: »

4.7% p.a. :pac:

NickCarraway

I'm a GP trainee.





Certainly not a reporter with the Sunday Indo........(nervous laugh)

RobFowl

NickCarraway wrote: »

I'm a GP trainee.





Certainly not a reporter with the Sunday Indo........(nervous laugh)

PM'ed

netaddict

Hi I'm a final year medical student over at University of Dundee, and hoping to head back to Ireland to do my GP training (preferably in the southeast). Would it be possible for somebody to PM me details of GP trainee salaries and also average assistant/partner income.

Also any tips for CV building, already have a BSc 1st and 3 publications but what else are people looking for in CV's.

Any help much appreciated. If you also have any info on experience of the schemes themselves that would be great.

tfitzgerald

I think the dept of finance publish a list of what gp's earn off their medical patients every year if you find this it should give you an idea nod doctor in Limerick earned €500k from medical card alone last year

RobFowl

tfitzgerald wrote: »

I think the dept of finance publish a list of what gp's earn off their medical patients every year if you find this it should give you an idea nod doctor in Limerick earned €500k from medical card alone last year

I think you you find that is gross practice income which is inclusive of subsidies for nurse/secretary/practice manager and does may include 2 or more doctors. It is not representative at all of individual doctors income.

tfitzgerald

RobFowl wrote: »

I think you you find that is gross practice income which is inclusive of subsidies for nurse/secretary/practice manager and does may include 2 or more doctors. It is not representative at all of individual doctors income.

yes you are right but thats just his medical card patients he still has the paying public either way its still very good money:)

ergo

found an article here, figures are slightly out of date but just gives a picture of how a practice could be earning 1 million but each GP could be on less than 100K (could start at ~60k), maybe end up a good bit higher than 100k for the long established more senior GP's in the practice but I can't comment on that as I'm just speculating

http://www.sbpost.ie/newsfeatures/truth-behind-top-gp-earnings-44194.html

Truth behind top GP earnings
06 September 2009 By Aileen O’Meara

Sometimes you have to look beyond the numbers. When it emerged last week that one family doctor practice had earned more than €1 million in fees from the general medical service (GMS) scheme last year, th ere were predictable assumptions that the scheme was making doctors into millionaires.

But Dr Catherine Coleman’s bulging practice in Berkeley Street in the north inner city of Dublin (2008 GMS earnings: €1,081,048) is as far from a millionaire’s playground as you could imagine. The practice has five doctors - after losing one to cutbacks - and also employs seven practice nurses and five administrative staff, t wo of whom work part-time.

It provides services almost exclusively to medical card patients, to such an extent that the cap of 2,000 patients imposed by the Health Service Executive (HSE) was reached long ago. Because they cannot take on any more medical card holders, Coleman and her colleagues see the family members of medical card patients for free these days. Their patients are predominantly the elderly, t he poor and the immigrant population.

‘‘She could spend an hour with one patient," said one of Coleman’s colleagues. ‘‘She looks after them very well. Even after they leave the area, th ey return to see the doctors here." Under the GMS scheme, family doctors receive an average fee of €162 per patient and, sin ce January this year, a fee of €290 for patients aged over 70.There are further payments towards practice costs such as secretarial services, as well as out-of-hours fees, and a small contribution towards pensions. Doctors’ medical indemnity insurance is also covered by the scheme.

The doctors also receive payments for vaccination programmes, cervical smears and primary immunisation programmes for all qualifying patients. Increasingly, t hey are playing a role in the management of chronic diseases and disease prevention. Like other doctors in the area, Coleman has worked to help patients avoid the overcrowded emergency and outpatient departments of the nearby Mater Hospital, by employing practice nurses to do ECGs, smears, phlebotomy and cardiac care. Without these services, the patients would have to rely on the already-stretched hospital.

Most of the top earners in the GMS (see panel) are based in the lower-income areas of Dublin and around the country. Unlike their counterparts in more affluent areas, Coleman and her colleagues do not combine private practice with their public patients to boost their incomes. The practice had six doctors last year, which translated as an average gross GMS income of just over €180,000 per doctor. But about half of the income was spent on practice staff, office equipment and overheads.

The Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) and the Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP) believe there are flaws in the GMS scheme. But both accept that the combination of capitation grants, contributions to practice costs and pensions offer family doctors a good standard of living, particularly for those that can combine private income with the schemes.

‘‘We are well paid in terms of the range of services we provide, but you need a steady income in order to invest in your practice," said Dr Mel Bates, spokesman for the ICGP. ‘‘But general practice does work extremely well, an d surveys show a widespread satisfaction rating amongst the general public." The IMO argues that the average gross payment to doctors under the GMS scheme is not anywhere near the €1 million mark, but is closer to €125,000 after practice costs and overheads are taken into account. The organisation believes that that is not an enormous amount for highly-educated self-employed professionals who often work long and unsocial hours.

And while €500 million was paid to doctors under the scheme last year, the figure will be significantly lower this year, according to the IMO. That is because the 2009 figures will reflect the impact of the halving of the capitation fee for the non-means-tested over-70s patients last January.

An 8 per cent cut in professional fees is also due to be implemented this month. Those two moves alone will reduce the payments to doctors by €75 million, according to the IMO. ‘‘The government has already taken 15 per cent off the incomes of family doctor s in the GMS scheme," said Dr Ronan Boland, a Cork-based GP and chairman of the IMO’s GP committee. Family doctors, like every other business, are feeling the pinch of the recession, according to Boland. Many have seen a 25 per cent fall in private income since the beginning of the year, resulting in layoffs and a freeze in staff wages.

‘‘The more you cut, the more you jeopardise the core services," said Boland. ‘‘We are as aware as everyone else of the perilous state of the public finances, and we will work with the department [of health] and the HSE to find cost savings." Those savings are likely to be found by cutting the cost of drugs in the GMS scheme rather than capitation fees. However, sources have not ruled out a further reduction in professional fees by the state - including fees to doctors - if the government finances continue to deteriorate at the current rate.

A joint working group, made up of representatives of the IMO, t he HSE and the Department of Health, is seeking savings of €65 million in drugs costs through prescribing practices and the greater use of generic drugs. It is also expected that the group will come up with proposals for the part-payment of some drugs by medical card holders, or those on long-term illness schemes. Behind the headlines, family doctors are keen to show that they are at the core of the health service, and the GMS scheme has enabled the Department of Health to offer public patients a family doctor service that is identical to that offered to private patients.

The GMS contract states that doctors must provide a service 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for 365 days a year, ensuring they are what the IMO calls the ‘‘immediate responders’’ to those who need doctors at any time, with equal access for public and private. The GPs themselves are self-employed business people, who see their flexible and responsive service as being in contrast to the inflexible bureaucracy of the HSE’s structures.

Family practice is Ireland is going through a period of rapid change, with a countrywide move to group practices, out of hours coops, and the so-called ‘feminisation’ of general practice.

A manpower shortage is looming and, despite the depiction of large incomes from GMS lists, the HSE is still finding it difficult to fill some lists in areas like north Dublin. That could have implications in the future, particularly as the looming swine flu pandemic brings the central role of the family doctor sharply into focus

also, as pointed out, 1 million is exceptional and nowhere near average

also, significant cuts in recent years (over 70's medical card and 2 separate sweeping cuts) have meant approx 24% cut in (GMS) practice income (not including dwindling income from private patients who can't afford to attend anymore)

netaddict

Thanks tfitzgerald, RobFowl, ergo on the replies so far. I generally find that the dept of finance results aren't generally representative of the net wage. Often the figure doesn't take into account that more senior GP's get the lists but often junior partners do most of the work, plus it doesn't include nurse, practice managers etc. From what I can gather myself is that the usual gross take home ranges anywhere from 100,000 to 140,000 euros but that would be estimating a bit from average gp charges and what I can see when looking around. Just hoping that folks would be able to confirm this.

I know doctors hate talking about take home especially with it often becoming a newspaper article and that I shouldn't care too much but just have to be realistic, I have nine years of working crappy jobs and the debts with it to pay back, plus the hopes of a house, family car etc, plus somedays when working on the wards and all the research projects one has to do it makes you think.

Personally I'd rather less money and a better work environment, and feel that is the case having worked in GP practices here. Overall pretty enjoyable, good response from secondary care, reasonable waiting lists so one feels like they are doing something for their patients. But with all the hullabulu one see's about the HSE online it makes you question is it worth coming back although I would like to head back home as that is where my heart is. But sometimes feel it would be nice to get a realistic picture of what I'm getting myself into, the pay being one components of it. Plus GP now take 6 years in 75% of the programs in the uk to train for so looses the appeal it once had over other specialities from a training time perspective.

dewdrop

I would like to revive this tread in that with the passage of time the scene has changed somewhat in that many practices now employ recently trained GPs on a wage. At least this is what i feel is happening. My query is very roughly what salary do those employees get and is their income confined to the agreed salary from the practice. Thanks.

pharmacrunch

Id also love to know the above info if anyone would be willing to provide either publicly or by PM!

Trying to get an idea of loan repayment possibilities following completion of the Gradmed course !!!

Thanks in advance

L1011

tfitzgerald wrote: »

yes you are right but thats just his medical card patients he still has the paying public either way its still very good money:)

Except its not the doctors income, its the practice income - it has absolutely zero correlation to their take-home pay.

Gael23

What would a GP that is just paid a salary as an employee earn?

sam34

Off-topic/uncivil/back seat modding posts deleted.

If you can't post constructively within the charter rules, then don't post. No further warnings.

RobFowl

The OECD survey from 2012 was published yesterday and showed GPs earnings averaged 118k. This was total including oohs and other work on top of usual GP work (based on tax returns for the first time not gross practice income) and they commented that the method used prior to this was inherently flawed and over estimated income substantially. Since 2012 more FEMPI cuts have been imposed so for 2014/2015 earnings you should probably deduct about 15% from that figure.

El_Dangeroso

RobFowl wrote: »

The OECD survey from 2012 was published yesterday and showed GPs earnings averaged 118k. This was total including oohs and other work on top of usual GP work (based on tax returns for the first time not gross practice income) and they commented that the method used prior to this was inherently flawed and over estimated income substantially. Since 2012 more FEMPI cuts have been imposed so for 2014/2015 earnings you should probably deduct about 15% from that figure.

That's a very average income for ~10 years training.

You could train in any number of industries for 10 years and be better off than that.

gctest50

pharmacrunch wrote: »

Id also love to know the above info if anyone would be willing to provide either publicly or by PM!

Trying to get an idea of loan repayment possibilities following completion of the Gradmed course !!!

Thanks in advance

You could have a nose around this for the craic too :


http://locumlink.ie/locumjobs.php

42894
Ireland, Republic of Ireland
General Practitioner
04 Aug 14
22 Aug 14
€6,450.00

43259
Ireland, Republic of Ireland
General Practitioner
05 Aug 14
29 Aug 14
€7,650.00

43490
Ireland, Republic of Ireland
General Practitioner
07 Jul 14
25 Jul 14
€10,125.00

.

Traumadoc

RobFowl wrote: »

The OECD survey from 2012 was published yesterday and showed GPs earnings averaged 118k. This was total including oohs and other work on top of usual GP work (based on tax returns for the first time not gross practice income) and they commented that the method used prior to this was inherently flawed and over estimated income substantially. Since 2012 more FEMPI cuts have been imposed so for 2014/2015 earnings you should probably deduct about 15% from that figure.

I would be very concerned that the tax authority released income figures regarding one particular profession.

I wonder would they do the same for barristers or solicitors or politicians?