INTERVIEW
Running smoothly Dr Clodagh McAllister has many things on her agenda as IDA President, including the DTSS contract and Covid-19, but says her number one aim is to continue the steady governance of the IDA.
It was Clodagh McAllister’s mother who first impressed upon her the benefits of being part of a collective, she says: “My mother was a pharmacist, and she was very involved in the Irish Pharmacy Union. She kept telling me I should join the IDA because it’s good to be part of a professional group – many voices are better than one voice”. Prior to becoming President-Elect last year, Clodagh really got involved in the work of the IDA about five years ago, when she was asked to join the GP Committee. It was not something she ever saw herself doing but found that once she started, she got a lot out of helping her fellow dentists: “I had never had any desire to be involved in the actual politics of the IDA but once I got on that committee, I really enjoyed it”.
dentists and patients something new: “It’s not a sticking plaster we want on the contract now. We need a new contract for the current climate because I think the medical card contract was originally initiated in 1994, so that’s nearly 30 years ago”.
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Part of the reason Clodagh decided to take on the PRSI scheme is the supports that were introduced after the successful negotiations between the IDA and the Department of Social Protection.
Aims and ambitions Clodagh believes the IDA is governed well and aims to keep that going for her year as President. Other important goals for her include representing members to the best of her ability and hopefully increasing membership. When it comes to the DTSS, Clodagh believes it is time the Government offered
Colm Quinn Journalist with Think Media
It's not a scheme Clodagh operates in her practice in Fairview in Dublin, and one thing she is keen to promote is independent practice: “I was always very into being independent, so that’s another one of my goals, to promote independent practice. It probably would have been a great thing to do, the medical card scheme, in the beginning because it would have got you busy fairly quickly but I decided that I wanted to be fully private, so initially I did neither the PRSI nor the medical card schemes, but in the past couple of years, we’ve started doing the PRSI scheme”. Part of the reason Clodagh decided to take on the PRSI scheme is the supports that were introduced after the successful negotiations between the IDA and the Department of Social Protection, she says: “They weren’t trying to cover everything because I didn’t want a third party running my business or being in control of my business. Also, it meant that a lot of my patients who were selfJournal of the Irish Dental Association | Aug/Sept 2021: Vol 67 (4) 185
