Budget 2023

Deeec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119686713#Comment_119686713

Dartdude is right though Andrew. I don't have a medical or gp card so I have to pay 65 euro every time I visit my gp - so I don't go unless I'm really really sick and I feel I really really need to see a GP. If it was free I would go alot more often.

The fact is GPS are booked out with card holders with very little wrong with them because they don't have to pay. I see it even with my own parents who have a medical card - they go see the gp for very small issues that could be dealt with common sense and perhaps a visit to the pharmacy. A charge of even 10 euro per visit would make free gp users consider if they really need to visit their doctor.

When something is free it's going to be exploited.

893bet

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119688853#Comment_119688853

Yes. Maths clearly not needed for this hourly paid 100k per year job😀

Important to note the lads that won’t work extra hours due to tax…….clearly don’t need the money is all.

Raichu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691266#Comment_119691266

It works in reverse also. People don’t attend their GP when they should because it costs anywhere from €50-70 for a visit. And often it’s a 2 minute consultation and out you go.

You can’t reasonably assume the practice is booked out with medical card patients because you just don’t know who is or who isn’t booked in or indeed how they’re paying either privately or without a MC.

Deeec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691342#Comment_119691342

I know I it does works in reverse - you are right. Thats the frustrating point. For me the cost is a turn off to attending my GP.

I know 2 girls who work in my GP practice who say there is huge problems caused by medical card holders clogging up appointments with minor complaints because its free and they usually have more time on their hands to attend ( ie pensioners and the unemployed). They say there is no way GP's will allow more free GP only cards to be given out as they cannot cope with more people attending. They cannot cope with the amount of people who want to see a GP now let alone making it free for more people!

This is a huge issue at the moment. In my area people are struggling to get an appointment to see their doctor when they are sick. Sometimes they are told there is no available appointment for a week or more. New people moving to the area cannot get accepted into any of the practices. Home GP visits to the homes of the elderly and the disabled are not happening anymore. General Practice medical care is a mess in many areas of the country and needs to be addressed.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691419#Comment_119691419

GPs aren't forced to take medical card business. If they don't want the business, they can stick with their private patients only. Funny how most of them don't take that approach.

This is mostly snobbery.

Murph85

The first thing they should sort out when the **** hits the fan next , is free GP visits! But even with that cover, they probably wouldnt touch it! Free for some and then E70 for other poor people. There would be a revolution in other countries over less!

Quazzie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691438#Comment_119691438

Why would they kill the golden goose?

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691448#Comment_119691448

If they were being flooded with GMS patients with sniffles, they wouldn't exactly be the golden goose.

Quazzie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691453#Comment_119691453

Of course they are. Then can deal with 10 sniffles an hour. Why would they want to deal with a patient who might spend a half hour explaining whats wrong then even longer to treat them.

One doctor in Mountmellick was paid €1.3M last year for medical card holders. I doubt he's worried about your €65 time waster.

Deeec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691438#Comment_119691438

My understanding of it is that once they take on medical card business they cant get rid of it. So many have created the problem themselves. I assume they get rewarded enough that its worth it aswell. Its the patients that are paying €60/€70 per visit that bear the brunt of this problem though - fees increasing, reluctance to attend the doctor because of cost, not being able to get an appointment and a poor GP service.

Im with the same GP practice since I was a baby. Growing up it was a small practice and was excellent. The GP got to know their patients and actually had a good relationship with them. This isnt the case in GP practices anymore. It expanded a few years ago and now its a crap service.

We need to get back to smaller practices I think.

Boggles

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691485#Comment_119691485

We need to get back to smaller practices I think

Are larger centres with pooled resources not the obvious way to go?

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119688486#Comment_119688486

Healthcare is in a slightly different league of importance than any of those services. Investing in GP services keeps people at work, out of hospital, looking after their kids, their family members with disabilities, their elderly parents and more.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691485#Comment_119691485

Unless we have slavery provisions in the contract, they can get out of it if they no longer want to do it. There is no contract that can force someone to take on work against their will.

If anything, we need larger practices, with more services being provided by practice nurses, physios, OTs, counsellors and more, to free up GPs for being GPs.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691465#Comment_119691465

We seem to be getting mixed messages here. Are the GMS patients soaking up GP time and workload or not?

Icemancometh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691229#Comment_119691229

Ibuprofen is covered and people sometimes come looking for that for kids, so might have been brufen that person was thinking of instead of calpol. Happens pretty infrequently though, hardly a drain on anyone's time.

Deeec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691551#Comment_119691551

I dont think so. Since the GP practice I attended expanded it offers an absolutely brutal service. It offered a much better service when it was a smaller 4 GP practice. Now you just have to see a random GP who is available if indeed you can get an appointment at all. Its so important for a GP to know their patients, know their medical history and have a relationship with them - Thats seriously lacking now in the bigger practices.

Raichu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691438#Comment_119691438

That’s actually wrong, if you don’t get a doctor after 3 attempts the HSE will assign a local GP to you, whether you, or the GP like it or not.

downtheroad

Could very easily say 1 or 2 free GP appointments per year per citizen. Maybe 6 visits for children / pensioners. Then apply reduced fees for kids / OAPs after 6 visits, and full fees for all others.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691983#Comment_119691983

They will assign a local GP who is a member of the GMS scheme to you. GPs aren't forced to join the GMS scheme.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691991#Comment_119691991

So punish sick people and people with disabilities for being sick or disabled - that's your proposed policy?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691907#Comment_119691907

So let the GP manage their service. Let them put up signs, or set expectations when booking, or actually say No to people, or give people a final warning or whatever they need to do. Do we have to babysit or spoonfeed GPs?

Airyfairy12

Im a teacher working in Dublin but cant afford to live there, it costs me 250 euro a month on public transport to get to and from work, I cant get a 22 hour contract so not on full pay, im in my 30's but cant afford to move out of my parents house. I didnt benefit from the budget in the slightest. Its awful to say it but im genuinly questioning my life choices and thinking id be better off on social welfare. My friends who are on it have a house they got for free, they have a car, a medical card, they never seem to struggle or want for anything. Then theres me, the big clown, thinking im doing the right thing by going to college and getting undergrad degrees, level 8 diplomas and a masters, getting up at 6am every morning to go work and not getting home till 5pm, working myself to the bone and I just hope I dont get sick or ever need an antibiotic as I wont be able to afford to go to the doctor if I do, I cant put a roof over my own head or get any real independence. Its so utterly depressing! The system is well and truly broken.

Geuze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691181#Comment_119691181

Good.

It was maybe 15 years ago the GP told me.

I'm happy things have changed.

Boggles

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119691966#Comment_119691966

know their medical history

Should be digitised and available at a mouse click.

kowloon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119693234#Comment_119693234

My GP in the UK seemed to have all my records available on their screen, I have no idea why we still have to wait for medical records to move through the post here.

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119693295#Comment_119693295

Yeah, why can’t we do things like the UK?

https://www.panorama-consulting.com/nhs-it-system-failure/

kowloon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119693457#Comment_119693457

Fair point but hopefully, the HSE could do a better job. That said, they did have the hack not long ago. We still have people carting trolley loads of folders within a hospital, no chance of your records being available at a click's notice in another facility. There will come a time when they get dragged into the late 20th century, like it or not.

Idbatterim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119692209#Comment_119692209

Would strongly be worth considering emigrating... Have you considered it?

WertdeerSC

Family Income Supplement €500 bonus in November is very welcome, along with changing energy supplier and getting €300 welcome credit and the €600 electricity credits, hopefully that'll cover a good whack of the bills! Comfortably poor, what a time to be alive!

jj880

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119694057#Comment_119694057

Cant seem to find a 300 euro welcome offer. That would be a great lift. Please share who you switched to.

WertdeerSC

SSE Airtricity online, dual fuel offer. I know they put their prices up, but who isn't!? You get 10% off gas and electric unit rates for 12 months too.

Odhinn

These 200 Euro energy credits - are they paid to the electric company directly, or do they go to the benefit claimant?

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119701326#Comment_119701326

Directly to the energy firm.

The other payments that depend on a specific benefit are paid to the claimaint.

Airyfairy12

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119693921#Comment_119693921

Why should I have to up root my life, leave all my family and friends to make a fresh start in another country were I know nobody! I shouldn't be pushed out of my home country, ive done nothing wrong, I contribute, I pay my taxes like everyone else, I teach your kids the best I can and hopefully give them a positive school experience, allot more than I recieved when I was at school, I work hard, why shouldnt I be able to create even a basic level of normal adult independence for myself? Why is emigration the only option available? I don't want to leave my home!