HSE defends work ratio calculation

THE HEALTH Service Executive has defended the system it uses to calculate the ratio of public to private patients treated by consultants in public hospitals.

In a statement yesterday, the HSE said the measures used to estimate the ratio were agreed with the Irish Hospital Consultants’ Association and the Irish Medical Organisation when the new consultants’ contract were introduced in 2008. Under the contract, income earned by consultants from private work above 20 per cent of their activity is to be returned to the hospital. For consultants appointed before July 2008, the limit is 30 per cent.

The HSE has written to more than 35 hospital consultants, whose private work, it estimated, represented more than 50 per cent of activity, informing them they were in breach of their contracts and faced penalties. But the consultants’ association yesterday challenged the HSE’s claims .

The association’s Donal Duffy said the HSE system for measuring work was “fundamentally flawed”, as it failed to recognise activity carried out in hospital emergency departments.