James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 12:

In page 22, line 39, after "service" to insert “or relevant communication".

This is a drafting amendment which is designed to align section 20(1) and (2) in terms of the references they contain to relevant communication. The purpose of section 20 is to provide that a health service provider who has been issued with a provider identifier must associate that identifier with the record of a health service provided for an individual and also use it in any relevant communication such as, for example, a referral letter from a GP to a hospital. In that respect, the section complements section 11 which requires the IHI to be similarly applied. This allows us to circumvent the terrible problem which sometimes arises in the context of individuals being obliged to revisit files after five or six years and not being in a position to figure out which doctor wrote what because the signatures are illegible. On foot of this section, the provider identifier will have to be supplied and it will, therefore, be easy to determine who wrote what note and who provided particular care.
A policy objective behind the Bill is to avoid unnecessary duplication. Accordingly, it provides that a health service provider who is a health practitioner already required under other legislation to use the registration number given to him or her by his or her professional regulatory body can instead use that number, rather than the provider identifier, in the record made of the health service provided and related correspondence. Such a scenario would arise, for example, under section 43(8) of the Medical Practitioners Act 2007 which provides that:

A registered medical practitioner shall, as soon as may be after the person has received the certificate [of registration] referred to in subsection (5), cause the registration number stated on that certificate to be included on all medical prescriptions and all other documentation and records, whether in paper or electronic format, relating to that practitioner’s practice as a registered medical practitioner.