A report today announced that public patients would have to wait up to 25 times longer than private patients for specific cancer scans, and today a listener called into Newstalk's Lunctime show to tell his story.

Following a trip to Kilimanjaro, he came back to Ireland suffering from head pain, and when he attempted to get it checked out by the hospitals scans, only to be told he wouldn't be on the priority list.

He told the story of how he was told by his doctor to "take a tumble and call an ambulance" in order to gain faster access to A&E scans.

"It's like you don't exist, pretty much. Whereas if I had the money, I could walk into the hospital tomorrow morning and get an appointment within six days."

He believes the same issues can be applied to the medical card, which he considers to be worthless now: "The medication costs are going up and up and up. I was given a prescription but had to wait two months before I could afford to get the medication."

You can listen to the entire conversation below: