Dr. Gerard Sheehan:

It is occurring to some extent but it holds true throughout the whole gamut of medicine. The difficulty for the general practitioner is that he or she is required to have knowledge of so many areas of medicine.

It is part of a general issue. In their training phase GPs act as senior house officers in hospitals. We have a GP trainee attached to our service in the Mater Hospital and he or she comes for three or four months. At the end of the rotation the trainee is quite knowledgeable on a range of infectious diseases, including Lyme disease.