A surge in Medical Device Sales jobs available

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Theatre Device Sales Reps required

Medical Device Theatre

We have seen an increase in demand for experienced Medical Device Sales Representatives in Ireland.

In particular for the Hospital Theatre market.

There are exciting developments and Product Launches in the pipeline and Medical Device Companies are now seeking experienced Medical Device Sales Reps to help with their Product launches and expanding Teams.

We are seeking the following -

  1. Theatre Device Sales Reps (Orthopaedics an advantage)
  2. Wound Care Device Sales Rep – Dublin
  3. Theatre Capital Equipment Sales Rep – Dublin
  4. Orthopaedic Device Sales Rep – Dublin
  5. Nutrition Product Sales Specialist – Munster (Cork)
  6. Diabetes Clinical Specialist – Sales Support

Essential Requirements for these roles -

  • Previous relevant experience in Ireland
  • A clean and full manual driving license
  • Must be living on the territory
  • Established relationships with Key Opinion Leaders in this field
  • Full flexibility to manage the territory

Packages for these roles approx  -

€45k – €55k basic

Car, Private Health Insurance, Daily Lunch Allowance, expenses, mileage, Laptop and mobile phone.

All come with a Bonus structure.

For further information about these and more current Medical Device Sales jobs -

Contact us

HSE admits €750m in cuts will hit services

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HSE CEO - Mr Cathal Magee

Mr Cathal Magee - HSE CEO

UP TO 600 public nursing home beds are to close, more acute hospital beds will shut and there will be cuts to community, mental health and disability services under the Health Service Executive’s service plan for the year, which was published yesterday.

Overall health spending is to be reduced by €750 million in the year ahead, which HSE chief executive Cathal Magee acknowledged would affect frontline services for patients.

The HSE has sought to mitigate the effect of the cuts by putting in place new efficiency measures and work practice changes. However, the effects of budget cuts and scaling back in staffing levels will be felt across the board.

The HSE anticipates that more than 3,300 staff will leave the organisation this year. Mr Magee said that, as 85 per cent of its personnel worked on the front line, this level of resource reduction could not be absorbed without it affecting the delivery system.

As reported by The Irish Times yesterday, a minimum of 555 public beds in community nursing units will close this year and possibly up to 600. Most of these bed closures will be spread across the entire network of community nursing units rather than being concentrated in specific facilities.

However, Mr Magee said a small number of units – “in single digits” – could be considered for total closure.

Acute hospitals will see their budgets drop, on average, by 4.4 per cent on last year. However, when account is taken of existing financial deficits being carried into this year, reduced expenditure of 7.8 per cent will be required.

Mr Magee acknowledged that this would lead to reduced hospital bed capacity but said it was too early to predict the scale of closures.

However, under the plan, even when efficiencies secured under its national clinical programmes are taken into account, the HSE is facing a reduction in hospital activity levels – as measured by the number of people treated – of 3 per cent on average.

The plan also says cuts in hospital activity will hit elective or non-urgent care, although a new maximum target of a nine-month wait for a procedure has been set.

No additional funding has been provided for the national cancer control programme, which will have to deal with a projected 3 per cent increase in incidence of the condition from its own resources.

The roll-out of the planned national bowel cancer screening programme has been put back until the final quarter of the year, due to budgetary pressures.

In relation to services for older people, more than 600 fewer people will be in receipt of home help hours than in 2011. Nationally the level of home help hours provided will be cut by 4.5 per cent.

An additional €35 million is to be invested in mental health services, which will allow for approximately 400 additional staff to be recruited. The investment will be aimed at enhancing child, adolescent and adult community teams as well as suicide prevention and counselling services.

However, mental health services overall will face a budget cut of just under 1 per cent. The plan said there would be cuts in inpatient mental health beds in line with the Government’s overall reform programme while there would also be reductions in payments to external agencies.

An additional €20 million is being allocated to primary care services “to fill as many vacancies as possible and to expand existing arrangements where sessional services are provided by allied health professionals”. However, under the plan cost efficiencies of 2.3 per cent are required in primary care, while a target of securing €124 million in savings has been set, mainly on drug prescribing changes.

An additional 1,270 places are to be made available under the “Fair Deal” nursing home scheme.

MARTIN WALL, Industry Correspondent, Irish Times

€10 million pharmaceutical price reduction planned

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Pharmacy drug price reduction

Pharmaceutical price reduction planned

The Department of Health is currently in negotiations with the Association of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers of Ireland (APMI) to deliver price reductions on generic medications to the tune of about €10 million in a full year, Irish Medical Times reports.

 New measures aimed at achieving further reductions in pharmaceutical expenditure envisage the establishment of an appropriate team with a project leader, within the Department of Health or the HSE — including the employment of additional pharmacists.

They include working with prescribers (both GPs and hospital consultants) to achieve more cost-effective prescribing, rolling out a ‘preferred medicine programme’ (identifying designated medicines, the preferential use of which over similar medicines would promote clinically-appropriate utilisation of pharmaceuticals in a cost-effective manner without compromising quality of care).

As part of the measures, certain products under the community drug schemes would be de-listed and/or have conditions imposed upon them. For example, glucosamine has been identified both nationally and internationally as “not being cost-effective”, the Department of Health said.

A recent study, claiming to be one of the largest and longest trials of the supplement, concluded that it neither alleviates pain nor disability and that “glucosamine probably offers little benefit… beyond whatever placebo effect it may provide”. De-listing glucosamine would save €5 million annually.

It’s the season to be jolly – Not drunk

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Drinking over Christmas

Drinking over Christmas

The Joint Oireachtas Health Committee faces new challenges in its efforts against alcohol abuse according to the Irish Medical News (IMN)

The problems associated with alcohol abuse reach every corner of society. It is associated with health problems such as liver cirrhosis and various cancers, it is linked to mental difficulties, self-harm and suicide, it places an unnecessary burden on the healthcare system, it is a factor in domestic abuse, it can destroy families and finances, it is connected to criminal behaviour and it plays a part in fatalities on Irish roads.

So what can be done to curb alcohol’s corrosive impact on society? Last month, Health Minister James Reilly stated that the report of the Steering Group for the National Substance Misuse Strategy is close to completion and is expected to be published in the coming months.

The report will look at policies concerning the supply, pricing, availability and marketing of alcohol, including the question of a minimum price for alcohol.

Minimum pricing is a mechanism of imposing a statutory floor in price levels for alcohol products that must be legally observed by retailers; its primary function would be to discourage high-risk levels of alcohol consumption.

The report will also look into measures for the policy areas of prevention strategies, treatment, rehabilitation and substance dependency, research and information. The Joint Oireachtas Health Committee is also playing its part in trying to eradicate the abundance of alcohol-related problems in the country.

Over the past two months, the Committee has engaged in much discussion on the issue of alcohol. In October, the first in a series of meetings was held on the topic, which culminated in Chair Deputy Jerry Buttimer stating that members of the Committee have adopted alcohol as one of their priority topics.

At the meeting, Mr Mick Devine, clinical director and clinical manager at Tabor Lodge, an addiction treatment centre in Cork, produced figures showing an “alarming increase” in the numbers of women who are seeking treatment for alcohol abuse.

Furthermore, the core service provided at Tabor Lodge is a 28-day residential treatment episode and Mr Devine said it has become evident that this period is not long enough.

He told the Committee that in the past 10 to 15 years, it has become clear that this timeframe is not long enough to adequately treat a client for alcohol addiction, “especially for people aged between 18 and 35 who are addicted to more than one substance and come from a disadvantaged community, may be unemployed and may be struggling with the addiction of another family member in the household.”

The Committee also heard that drinking in the home has exacerbated problems of alcohol abuse and dependency for women. “Bearing in mind that it might not have been so possible for a woman to behave in a drunken manner in the pub, she is drinking more as the pub trade diminishes and the focus of drinking shifts to the home,” Mr Devine said.

The incidence of domestic violence is also on the up, he stated, and people are also drinking at an earlier age. “Where youths might once have begun drinking in their mid-teens, it has been reported in the past 10 years that they are starting to drink in their early teens.”

The clinical director noted that if one asks a patient in Tabor Lodge whether there is a family member addicted also, the usual answer is that there is and it is usually the father. “It is now common to expect someone between 18 and 35 years to be poly-addicted,” Mr Devine said.

“Individuals in this age bracket are still reporting that alcohol is the favourite, first and main drug, but they are using others also. … It is unusual to have an under-35 year old addict in this country addicted to only one substance and I suspect that is not confined to Cork.”

Committee member Senator Colm Burke also revealed some alarming figures showing the number of babies who went into delirium tremens or DTs after being born, as a result of maternal consumption of alcohol during pregnancy.

The number of babies delivered in the Rotunda Hospital who experienced DTs amounted to 44 in 2008. This fell slightly to 38 in both 2009 and 2010. In Holles Street Hospital in 2009, 20 such babies were delivered, he said.

Speaking to IMN, Senator Burke said the biggest issue facing Ireland now is the health problems created by alcohol, especially in emergency departments where many people end up as a result of injury through drinking.

Furthermore, he reiterated the problem of domestic drinking. “You go into a pub and if you have too much to drink, the publican might say ‘I’m not serving you any more’,” he said. “But there are a lot of people drinking at home where there is no-one to cut them off.”

Senator Burke drew attention to campaigns in recent years that have highlighted the dangers of drink-driving.

He also said that third-level institutions need to take on board some of the responsibility. Last month, the Committee welcomed representatives from the Advertising Standards Authority for Ireland (ASAI) and from the Alcohol Marketing Communications Monitoring Body.

Two of the functions of the ASAI are to deal with complaints about advertisements from any source and to monitor advertisements for compliance with its code. According to Mr Edward McCumiskey, ASAI President, very few alcohol advertisements are found to be in breach of the Authority’s codes.

“For example, in 2002, 12 advertisements were found to be in breach of the code but none has been found to be so since 2007,” he told the Committee. The ASAI code on alcohol states that alcohol advertising should be “socially responsible and should not exploit the young and immature”.

“It requires that anyone depicted in an advertisement for alcohol should look, and be, over 25 years of age. Aspects of youth culture should not be portrayed and advertisements must not appear in media primarily intended for children,” Mr McCumiskey continued.

Senator Burke emphasised the importance of educating young people so as to prevent them becoming victim to future alcohol abuse. “Colleges and other third-level institutions need to take a measure of that responsibility,” he said.

“Especially in first year of study, in that crucial run up to Christmas. Students need to be educated on the dangers of excessive drinking.”

The Committee is due to have two more meetings concerning alcohol issues in mid-December, and one of these will see attendance from HSE representatives. The Committee will then prepare a report on the topic to send to Minister Reilly. The report will be published by the end of January, 2012, the IMN heard.

Senator Burke said the priority will be to look at ways to stop excessive drinking. “It’s about how we get the message out there. We need to be very aggressive in letting people know you can enjoy a drink without having excessive drinking.

Jackie Brown Medical are nominated 3 times!

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NRF Awards Ceremony

NRF Awards night

Jackie Brown Medical were nominated 3 times on the Annual National Recruitment Federation Awards Ceremony last Friday @ the Shelbourne Hotel, Dublin.

The 3 nominations were -

  1. Agency of the Year
  2. Best in Sector – Medical and Healthcare
  3. Best Online Service for our fantastic new website and online presence.

The Team here are very proud to have been nominated so many times and we wish to thank our Client Companies and our Job Seekers for remaining our inspiration for striving to be the Best Medical Recruitment Agency in Ireland.

 

Our Midwives do us proud

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Our Midwives do us proud

Safe in the hands of our Midwives

According to the Medical Independent, a major study has found that midwifery-led care is as safe as consultant-led care but uses less intervention in pregnancy and childbirth.

The study, commissioned by the HSE and conducted by the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin, involved 1,653 women having babies in the HSE Dublin North-East region from 2004 to 2007, and compared the usual consultant-led maternity care with a new model of care provided by midwives in two integrated Midwifery-led Units (MLUs) in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda and Cavan General Hospital.

The number of babies needing resuscitation at birth, or admission to the special care baby unit, was the same in both groups. Almost 6 in 10 women in the CLUs (57 per cent) had their labours speeded up by either having their ‘waters’ broken or having oxytocin, given intravenously by ‘drip’, compared with only 4 in 10 women in the MLUs (40 per cent).

In labour, fewer women in the MLU group chose to have epidurals (18 per cent) than did those in the CLU (24 per cent).

A signficant 85 per cent of women attending the MLUs said they would recommend the care they had received to a friend, compared with 70 per cent of those having usual care. Although facilities in the MLUs were quite luxurious, the cost of care for each woman was €332.80 less than in the usual hospital system. In addition, this model of care enabled consultant obstetricians to devote more time to caring for women with pregnancy complications, who really need their input.

Cecily Begley, Professor of Midwifery in Trinity College Dublin and principal investigator of the project said the results demonstrated the high quality of maternity care in this country. “Safety is our primary concern”, she said, “and this study has shown conclusively that low-risk women receive safe care from both midwives and obstetricians. Midwifery-led care uses fewer interventions, however, and most women prefer that”.

The study has been published in the journal BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth

Letter from HSE requesting a stop on Locum Doctor Recruitment

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A&E Locum recruitment stopped

A&E Locum recruitment stopped

Hospitals across the country have received a letter from the HSE stipulating that they must stop recruiting locums to fill vacancies in emergency medicine, according to the Irish Medical News (IMN)

However, a senior consultant in emergency medicine has questioned the HSE’s contention that the recent recruitment drive in India and Pakistan has “solved” the need for locum cover in emergency departments (EDs). It is understood that the memo, sent by Ms Laverne McGuinness, the HSE’s National Director of Performance and Financial Management, on October 25, has caused particular issues at University Hospital Limerick where there has been an ongoing shortage of middle grade doctors to staff its ED. Dr Fergal Hickey, former president of the Irish Association of Emergency Medicine (IAEM) and a consultant in emergency medicine at Sligo General Hospital, told IMN that due to the recruitment drive for doctors from India and Pakistan, the HSE believes “there is now no need for locum cover”.

According to Dr Hickey, vacancies in EDs are mainly at registrar grade, however, he said that the HSE “seems to believe that very junior, very inexperienced doctors from India and Pakistan recruitment schemes” are adequate to fill these vacancies or that doctors can be arbitrarily transferred from other services. The HSE responded saying that “significant savings” can be made by filling posts that are currently filled by locums with doctors recruited through the drive in India and Pakistan. However, Dr Hickey contended that there is “a clear lack of understanding at senior management level in the HSE about where the vacancies in emergency medicine are and the calibre of doctors required to fill these vacancies”. “Our main vacancies are at middle grade whereas the available doctors from this particular recruitment drive are at a more junior level, so the problem will continue,” he said. Dr Hickey said that HSE management “think that they have solved the recruitment crisis, which clearly they haven’t”.

Dr Hickey said that neither the HSE nor the Department of Health understands the mismatch between existing vacancies and the doctors who have been recruited from India and Pakistan, who do not have “the experience or expertise” necessary. The HSE told IMN that doctors recruited in India and Pakistan are highly qualified and experienced and “are particularly well suited to working in the Irish health system” as they train in the same system used in Ireland. According to Dr Hickey, this is a “naive” perception. “A middle grade doctor working in the ED might have three or four years experience in the Irish healthcare system, and a year or more in an ED,” he explained. “And they’re seeking naively to replace those with people who have just literally arrived in the country.”