Ms Laura Magahy:

I fully recognise the role that pharmacists could play and we are actively exploring that.

On the questions raised by the Deputy on medication errors, we are looking at e-pharmacy as a priority project, and the HSE has agreed the governance for that. The individual health identifiers, IHIs, are now in place, which give the basis for the shared care record. The e-pharmacy project will be the quickest win in value for the patient from a shared record point of view. If we had that and we are looking at a patient portal, the patient would go to the private hospital or to the places the Deputy has mentioned, and their medications would be on their portal, which would be able to show what have had. That is critical to the move between the hospital and the community, and for the patient to move between different care settings. That is an absolute priority. This is firmly on Mr. Sullivan's radar as well. I will be happy to come back to the committee regarding progress on this issue.