Professor David Keegan:

No, through a number of different ways, that clinic has supported and delivered eye care in our region. It is close to the Mater and patients for surgery come in to see us from there. The clinic is obviously a key stakeholder. It is a big optometric and medical eye specialist practice in the region. There are obviously other funding mechanisms within the HSE that support that, in particular for medical card holders and other patients. What we were looking to do was to have a whole-population solution not just based on whether people have medical cards or are insured or not insured, because we realise there is a gap between those patients who do not have a medical card and are not insured and need to be covered by the public health system. There were some gaps within that. We see that also in paediatric service delivery as well. In age bands there are barriers to full access to care. This model was looking at breaking all of those open and ensuring that there would be equitable access to care right across the spectrum. We still work with the unit at Medical Optics in Fairview as part of this process, but we do feel we need to grab a bit of ownership and solutions to the entire problem and keep it within the HSE and then just use judiciously any external providers when it is absolutely necessary.