Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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1653. To ask the Minister for Health the estimated full year cost to increase the number of GP training places in 2024 to 375; the number of GP training places provided in 2023; and the number of persons applied for a GP training place in 2023, in tabular form. [1161/24]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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To increase the number of GPs working in the country and thereby improve access to GP services, the annual intake of doctors into the GP training programme has been increased by over 80% since 2015. Last year, there were 286 new entrants to GP training, and 350 places for new entrants are planned for this year. The ICGP, which is responsible for training GPs, indicated that 968 applications were received for 2023, while 1,311 applications were received for this year.

Budget 2024 provides for the increase to 350 places for new entrants to GP training for 2024. The annual year one cost of a doctor on the GP training programme is approximately €105,000, accordingly the cost increasing the number of GP training places by a further 25 places to 375 in 2024 would be approximately €2.6 million.

However, it is important to note that capacity to increase the number of GP trainees must be built through the health service, as for the first two years of training GP trainees rotate through a variety of hospital specialities. Expanding the number of such places available for GP trainees may also carry additional costs which cannot be quantified at this time.