No plans to extend community ophthalmic scheme

There are no plans to extend the community ophthalmic services medical treatment scheme (COSMTS) despite calls from doctors to do so, the Medical Independent (MI) has been informed.

At the IMO’s AGM in April, doctors passed a motion calling on the Department of Health and the HSE “to resource the nationwide extension” of the COSMTS.

The COSMTS, which commenced as a pilot in 2004, delivers medical and minor surgical eye care to patients outside the acute care setting.

However, a HSE spokesperson told MI that the ongoing implementation of integrated eye care teams would see these teams provide care for minor injuries, corneal foreign bodies, and acute sore eyes in the primary care setting. This system would be cost-effective, they added.

According to the HSE, five physicians are contracted under the COSMTS operating across five locations: Ranelagh, Fairview, Bray, Naas, and Cork.

In 2017, the primary care eye services review group concluded that the COSMTS should be reviewed and updated.

Such a review of the COSMTS would be needed “as the development of integrated eye care teams will allow those currently receiving their care in the hospital setting (except for COSMTS patients) to receive their care in the community setting, once the appropriate facilities and staffing are available”, according to the HSE spokesperson.

Last year, the then Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said the HSE had advised that an evaluation of the current operation of the COSMTS needed to be conducted before it was extended.

“This review remains a priority for my Department in 2024,” Minister Donnelly said in January 2024.

“The requirements of this review have been regularly discussed in meetings between officials from my Department and their HSE counterparts as well as internally within my Department. This process is continuing in tandem with the pursuit of other priorities in the provision of appropriate eye care.”