Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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Question 96: To ask the Minister for Health and Children if general practitioners are allowed to charge for administering a blood test to patients with a full medical card; the circumstances in which a GP will charge for a service to a medical card holder; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [45566/09]

Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Independent)
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Under the General Medical Services (GMS) contract, either capitation or fee-per-item, the general practitioner (GP) undertakes to provide all proper and necessary treatment of a kind generally undertaken by a GP to these patients.

Accordingly, under these contracts a GP should not demand or accept any payment or consideration for services provided by him/her, including blood tests, where they are indicated as part of a recognised treatment of an ongoing medical condition of a patient.

I am aware that some GPs charge for the transport of patients' blood samples to the hospital as this is not covered under the GMS Scheme. However, the option of attending the public hospital directly for phlebotomy services is always available to GMS clients.

If the HSE is made aware of specific cases where GMS patients are being inappropriately charged by GP contractors, it will arrange to have such cases investigated as appropriate.