Dr. Colm Henry:

The Senator mentioned lung screening, which I might return to. On the question of doctors from abroad, the subject of a hearing here before was consultants not on a specialist register. The importance of that for us, and it is a function of the Irish Medical Council, is that it is an assurance system for us and, through us and the Irish Medical Council, for the patients that consultants have received a training be it here or in any other healthcare system where there is mutual recognition between us and their system of regulation. While of course we have recruitment problems and challenges, the process for registering doctors and deciding what category of registration, that is how they practice and how patients can be assured of their area of expertise, is a function of the Irish Medical Council that has been developed over many years, going back to the Medical Practitioners Act 2007. That has been a focus of discussion at this committee before in our journey to ensure consultants are on the specialist register. When we look at doctors from other healthcare systems, some of them have mutual recognition with our system and some, particularly outside the EU, do not. We have to make sure their skills, expertise and training are aligned with the services we are providing here so that patients can be assured that they are getting the expertise and training they need.