The chief executive officer of Dublin's Beaumont Hospital, Mr John Lamont, has been selected as the new registrar of the Medical Council.
While the Medical Council said last evening that it was not yet appropriate to announce who would be taking up the post, The Irish Times has learned that the job has been offered to Mr Lamont.
The post of registrar of the Medical Council is essentially that of CEO of the body responsible for the regulation of the medical profession in the Republic.
Mr Lamont will take up the post alongside a new Medical Council at the end of April. Elections for the 25-member council are currently under way.
Mr Lamont (47) has been chief executive officer of Beaumont since 2001. He started his career as a medical scientist in the haematology department of Temple Street Children's Hospital before moving to a similar post in Jervis Street Hospital, where he worked from 1981 to 1988. He transferred from Jervis Street and the Richmond hospitals to the new Beaumont Hospital in 1988.
His first senior management post was clinical services co-ordinator in Beaumont from 1996 to 2000. He was appointed assistant chief executive officer of the Northern Area Health Board in the eastern region in May 2000.
Mr Lamont holds an MSc from Dublin City University and is a Fellow of the Institute of Biomedical Science in London. A member of the health service accreditation board, he has represented the Dublin Academic Teaching Hospitals (DATHs) on a number of health reform project groups.