The case for specialists

Dara Gantly on the importance of having appropriately trained consultants in our hospitals, and how a dangerous situation has been created by the recruitment crisis In case you missed it, the HSE has accepted that the appointment of non-specialist doctors who are not on the Medical Council’s Specialist Register to consultant posts poses a safety risk to patients. Well, that is my interpretation. The Executive has acknowledged that those represented to the public as consultants must be appropriately qualified and competent to perform the duties and functions of a consultant, and that such individuals must be employed in regulated posts…