Pharmacist wins HSE payments case

COURT DECISIONTHE HIGH Court has found that the Health Service Executive was in breach of its contract with pharmacists when it decided to reduce payments to them for the provision of drugs and services under the General Medical Services (GMS) scheme.

In a judgment delivered yesterday at the Commercial Court, Ms Justice Mary Finlay Geoghegan said the pharmacists were entitled to be paid the amounts due to them under their agreement with the HSE.

She said the HSE could not unilaterally alter the reimbursement price of medicines and should have consulted the IPU.

The test case was taken by Patrick Hickey of Hickey's Pharmacies, a chain of 24 stores, but the judgment will have an impact on all pharmacists operating the GMS scheme.

The group had sought orders overturning decisions by the HSE in September 2006 and September 2007 to reduce payments to pharmacists. It claimed those decisions breached the Community Pharmacy Contract of 1996 and would lead to losses of more than €2 million annually.

The ex-wholesale price paid to pharmacists for drugs provided under the GMS scheme had included a 17.6 per cent mark-up since 1971, the court was told.

However, the HSE had argued that the pharmacies were in fact being given discounts by the wholesalers and so were making an extra profit from the HSE payments. They said the Minister for Health was entitled to reduce that mark-up to 8 per cent.

Ms Justice Finlay Geoghegan noted that since the original agreement was put in place, other schemes had been included under it, but she said this did not alter the fundamental terms of the agreement.