Reimbursement of emergency medical costs?

Morby

A family member took ill outside of standard GP hours over the weekend, so as a result they had to go see an out of hours GP.

They have a medical card but as it is not registered with this GP they had to pay the full consultation fee and extra for prescribed medicines which were given on a private prescription.

Total cost was around €100 for visit and meds.

Is there any way they could claim back this cost of this as a medical card holder?

Thanks.

Whiplashy

When I was in college (over a decade ago, I admit) I was able to see a GP that I wasn't registered with and my medical card covered it. I just had to sign a form. All prescriptions were medical card ones too. I can't imagine things have changed too drastically since then. I don't think the person should have been charged, unless perhaps the GP in question doesn't accept medical card patients. It's a strange one, so I'll be interested to see what others have to say.

nothing

There's a sign up in my gp office that if you attend the out of hours doctor, you have to present your medical card or you'll be charged. I'm not sure about reimbursement after the fact though.

Morby

The person that had to see out of hours emergency treatment with a GP they are not registered with.

This GP does take medical cards and they were asked if they had a medical card to which they answered yes.

The secretary then asked what GP their medical card is registered with and said because it was with another GP in the locality that they would have to pay privately.

The prescription was faxed to a late night pharmacy. They asked about getting a GMS prescription but were told it was already faxed on and more a less a "what else do you want us to do" type of response.

Surely others have been in this situation before when they've gotten ill outside of Monday-Friday 9-5pm but which also didn't warrant A&E?

I'm sure it's happened before

zell12

You won't be reimbursed unless you had and showed MC at the time
https://www.hse.ie/eng/services/list/2/gp/out-of-hours-services/gp-out-of-hours-services.html