Ms Caroline Spillane:

Deputy Kelleher asked about the Irish Medical Council's complaints process. Our system for categorising complaints outlines the number of complaints the Irish Medical Council would receive in any 12-month period. For 2012 we received approximately 420 complaints. These are categorised into very broad areas, such as treatment or professional standards. Of course, many complaints concern a number of related issues and, as such, are not categorised in the narrow way suggested here. To the best of my knowledge and in agreement with the president, we have not received any complaints regarding this section of the guide to professional conduct and ethics. Hypothetically, if the council were to receive a complaint, the council has quite a sophisticated complaint management process that is defined through the Medical Practitioners Act, which would, in the first instance, necessitate the investigation of the complaint by the preliminary proceedings committee. If that committee felt there was a prime facie case, an inquiry may be held into that complaint.

Deputy Ó Caoláin asked about registration. Some 18,000 doctors are registered with the Irish Medical Council and they are registered in five different divisions of the medical register as follows: the supervised division; the trainee-specialist division; the general division; the specialist division - I will go on to talk about that; and a sub-division, which is the intern division of the trainee-specialist division. Of the 18,000 doctors registered, a minority would be in the specialist division. However, there are approximately 3,000 to 4,000 doctors who are currently registered with us in this division. It is difficult to be precise on numbers because the register is quite dynamic and changes literally on a day-to-day basis. We have conducted some surveys among registrants. For example, we know that most of the registrants who are registered with the Irish Medical Council practise full-time rather than in a part-time capacity.

Within the specialist division, we have a sub-categorisation for some of the specialist areas that Deputy Ó Caoláin has mentioned. All of this information is available in the Medical Council's annual report and is also available on the Medical Council's website. Any member of the public can, of course, search the Medical Council's website for information and details about their doctor, and there is a facility on the website to search for a registrant. Approximately 250,000 people used that facility in 2012, so we find it is a very valuable resource for members of the public and those in health professions who wish to understand the qualifications of the doctors operating in the health system.

The president has outlined in the submission made by the Medical Council that to be on the specialist division of the medical register requires that a doctor's education and training is benchmarked to the highest international standards, so the Medical Council can stand over the qualifications, education, training and competence of doctors who are on the specialist division of the medical register.