The Health Service Executive (HSE) has unveiled its biggest ever overhaul of GP and community care services.

It has published plans to set up new groups which will be responsible for all GP, social and primary care in their regions.

Nine community healthcare organisations are being established, comprising 90 primary care networks to provide services to some 50,000 people.

The HSE says this means a network for every large town or district. 

A new report, 'Community Healthcare Organisations - Report and Recommendations of the Integrated Service Area Review Group', sets out how health services - outside of acute hospitals - will be organised and managed.

The plan will see the country drawn up into different networks | Image: HSE

Launching the report, the director-general of the HSE, Tony O'Brien said: "In 2014, more than half of our total health spend on operational services is in the community healthcare sector."

"This sector is significant and the reform of these structures will facilitate a move towards a more integrated health care system, improving services for the public by providing better and easier access to services, services that are close to where people live, more local decision making and services in which people can have confidence," he added.

The team that carried out the review consulted with more than 600 multi-disciplinary health service staff and 40 representative groups.

The HSE says the new groups are designed to provide a better-integrated service for patients with more than one condition, and will eventually replace the HSE entirely.

Pat Healy of the HSE is the man behind the project. He he says the changes will not cost the taxpayer a penny.