GP fee hike despite recession

In spite of the effect the recession is having on people's incomes, GPs are not reducing their fees accordingly, according to irishhealth.com latest viewer's poll.

While prices in Ireland may be decreasing in general, this has not been reflected in the current cost of visiting your GP, with our poll revealing that some GPs have actually increased their charges for private patients in recent months.

We asked our viewers whether their GP had reduced their fees over the past six months.

Sixty five per cent answered that their GP's fees had remained the same, while 26% said their doctor had actually increased fees in recent months.

Only two per cent said their GP had actually reduced their private fees recently.

According to recent statistics from the Central Statistics Office (CSO), health costs are one of the few areas of economic activity that are bucking deflationary trends and are actually increasing.

The CSO figures show health costs, including hospital and GP charges, increased by 3.4% between June 2008 and June 2009.

GPs have recently had major reductions imposed by the Government in the fees they get for treating medical card patients. However, they appear not to be following suit with the fees they charge for treating their private patients.

Just over one-third of the population is currently covered by medical cards.

According to an article in the latest Forum, the journal of the Irish College of GPs, while no figures have been compiled recently, anecdotal evidence indicates that GPs' private practice "footfall' and income, has reduced by around 25% on average over the past six months

This, in addition to the recent medical card income reduction, may partly explain the reluctance of many GPs to reduce their private charges.

Dr Ronan Boland, Chairman of the IMO's GP Committee, said the IMO was precluded by competition law from recommmending what fees GPs should charge.

He said most practices would periodically review their fee structure, taking into account practice profile, cost base and other factors.

[Posted: Tue 04/08/2009]