TWO DENTISTS have lost a High Court bid to stop the HSE implementing changes to dental treatment for medical card holders.
Mr Justice Roderick Murphy found there was no breach of contract by the HSE last April when it issued a circular introducing a new scheme whereby it gave priority to funding for treatment with a focus on pain relief, sepsis and exceptional emergency situations.
Under the old scheme, dentists needed prior approval from the HSE for certain treatments, including providing dentures, while other procedures did not require such approval. The Irish Dental Association claimed last April’s circular would break up the service it provides to medical card holders.
Last June, Martin Reid, Moville, Donegal, and James Turner, Baltinglass, Wicklow, obtained a High Court injunction preventing the HSE from implementing the scheme pending the full hearing.
Mr Justice Murphy heard the case last year and ruled yesterday the injunction should be discharged. He said the dentists, members of the association, had participated in the dental treatment service scheme, which was introduced in 1994 for medical card holders. In 1999, the association negotiated revised procedures which provided the then health boards (now the HSE) with the right to take whatever measures they needed to live within their budgets and statutory obligations.
The 2010 budget limited expenditure under the scheme to €63 million and, as a result, the HSE issued the circular last April. The two dentists claimed it was a breach of their contract with the HSE.
Mr Justice Murphy said it was common that dentists who participated in the scheme since it was introduced in 1994 were bound by its terms.
The 1999 agreement resulted in a benefit to members of the association through an acknowledgment by the health boards of the restoration of parity of professional fees paid for the treatment of PRSI workers by the Department of Social, Family and Community Affairs, the judge said.
It was also an acknowledgment by the association of the health boards’ statutory obligations to stay within budget, the judge said.
Having regard to the scheme’s statutory background, the HSE circular was therefore contractually binding on the dentists, he ruled.