Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their presentations and for the work they do. Sometimes we have medical practitioners before the committee and we do not acknowledge their work and the contribution they make to our healthcare sector. It is important that we do so.

We heard from the representatives of the Chiropractic Association of Ireland earlier this morning. One of my questions related to insurance, which is a big issue that has been on my desk for quite a while. In fairness, the regulation covering medical practitioners is in place and it provides that every medical practitioner must have insurance. I introduced a Private Members' Bill in 2012, which was eventually adopted by the Department and has now gone through the whole process. The representatives of the chiropractors advised us this morning that every one of their members has professional indemnity insurance. We are talking about 130 practitioners who are providing a service to the public. They are saying they are regulated in the sense of it being within their own organisation and profession to such an extent that each member has professional indemnity insurance. I am concerned that they are being excluded from a regulation, which makes sure that the standard they have set themselves is maintained.

If they are delivering a high level of service, and some of them are providing an X-ray service, have radiologists come across litigation involving chiropractors where professional radiologists had to give evidence in such cases? If that has not occurred, why can we not incorporate them in the regulation? We are talking about a very small number of practitioners.

Chiropractors will be prevented from making referrals. The witnesses have said that where medical practitioners refer people to radiologists for X-rays, the radiologist reviews whether the X-ray is necessary. If chiropractors refer people for X-rays, what is the concern about regulating them in the sense that they are referring people to professionals who can review and decide whether it is appropriate that an X-ray should be carried out? A radiologist would sign off on that and if the radiologist is happy that it is a reasonable request, what is the concern about including chiropractors in the regulation? That is an important question. We are talking about 130 practitioners in total and about 11 who provide radiology services. It is a very small number. With respect to the 11 practitioners who provide radiology services, we all know that radiology equipment costs a huge amount of money. It is a matter of whether we will now have 11 practitioners who will no longer be able to use very good equipment and it will simply be parked. We are not talking about hundreds of practitioners but about a very small group and about including them in the regulation.