Reviewed by an IMC-registered GP, not a rule engine

Repeat Prescriptions
Online Ireland

Already established on a medicine and just need it renewed? A GP registered with the Irish Medical Council reviews your written request — no video call — and, if it is safe to issue, sends the prescription to your pharmacy over Healthmail.

From €25GP review, no consultation
price shown before you pay
Request a PrescriptionHow It Reaches Your Pharmacy
12-hour targetFor a GP decision
HealthmailHSE-approved, our only route
GDPR compliantEncrypted, never shared

Book Consultation

No availability
Consultations are with GPs registered with the Irish Medical Council. See our doctors.

Two limits worth knowing before you pay

We can only send prescriptions over Healthmail, so if your pharmacy has no @healthmail.ie address we cannot send to it — ring them and ask if you are not sure. And some medicines cannot be prescribed remotely at all: controlled drugs are outside this service entirely, whatever the request says. Neither of those is something a GP can waive on the day.

IS THIS THE RIGHT SERVICE

Renewal, Not a New Prescription

This service answers one narrow question: can the medicine you are already on be continued safely on the strength of what you have written? If the honest answer needs a doctor to assess you, you want a consultation instead.

A good fit when

  • You are already established on the medicine and have been taking it for a while
  • A doctor prescribed it for you originally, and you can say who and roughly when
  • The condition it treats is stable and has not changed or worsened
  • Any monitoring your medicine needs — bloods, blood pressure, a review — is up to date
  • You are not asking to start, stop, or change the dose of anything

Book a consultation instead when

  • It would be the first time you have taken this medicine
  • It is a controlled drug — sedatives, sleeping tablets and opioid painkillers are outside this service entirely
  • Your condition has changed, worsened, or is causing you new symptoms
  • Monitoring your medicine requires has not been done recently
  • You want the dose changed, or you are having side effects you want addressed
See how an online consultation works

We deliberately do not publish a list of medicines we will prescribe. Whether a renewal is safe depends on you and your circumstances, not on which medicine it is, and a doctor is the only one who can make that call.

HOW IT REACHES YOUR PHARMACY

Healthmail, and Only Healthmail

Healthmail is the secure clinical email service approved by the HSE and used by GP practices and pharmacies across Ireland to exchange prescriptions and clinical documents. It is the route your own GP surgery uses when they send a prescription to your chemist, and it is the only route we use.

When a GP approves your request, the platform renders a signed Irish prescription — your details, the medicine, dose and quantity, and the prescriber's name, signature and Medical Council registration number — and transmits it to the Healthmail address of the pharmacy you nominated. A copy appears in your account at the same moment, so you can see exactly what was sent.

If a transmission fails, the platform retries it automatically on a back-off schedule rather than leaving it to chance, and a transmission that still will not go through raises a ticket for our operations team to chase. You are not left assuming something arrived when it did not.

The limitation is the honest flip side of the same fact: a pharmacy with no @healthmail.ie address cannot be reached. Most Irish pharmacies have one, but not every premises does, and there is no national directory we can check on your behalf. One phone call to your pharmacy settles it.

For PharmaciesAbout Healthmail
WHAT THE REVIEW INVOLVES

No Video Call Does Not Mean No Doctor

The consultation is what you skip. The clinical decision is not.

A named, registered doctor reads it

Requests are assigned automatically to a GP registered with the Irish Medical Council, normally within half an hour. A person makes the decision — there is no rule engine issuing prescriptions on a doctor’s behalf.

Allergies are re-checked at the point of approval

The allergies on your record are re-read server-side when the GP approves, not just when you filled in the form, and anything recorded since you submitted has to be acknowledged before approval can go through.

Duplicates are flagged

The platform checks whether you have already been prescribed the same thing recently, so a forgotten earlier request cannot quietly become a double supply.

The GP can say no

If the request cannot be answered safely from what you have written, the GP declines it and asks you to book a consultation instead. That is the system working, not failing.

HOW IT WORKS

Request to Pharmacy, Step by Step

With the timings we actually hold ourselves to, rather than the best case.

1

You submit the request and pay

A short questionnaire: what the medicine is, the dose, how often you take it, how long you have been on it, who prescribed it, how the condition is, whether it is working, and any side effects. Then you pick your pharmacy.

2

A GP is assigned, usually within 30 minutes

Assignment is automatic and matched to the doctor’s registered scope. Our internal target for a GP decision is 12 hours; a request still unanswered at 18 hours is reassigned to another GP automatically.

3

If approved, a signed Irish prescription is generated

A PDF carrying your details, the medicine, dose and quantity, and the prescriber’s Medical Council registration number and signature. A copy lands in your account at the same time.

4

It is transmitted to your pharmacy over Healthmail

Healthmail is the HSE-approved secure clinical email service. If the first attempt fails the platform retries automatically, and a transmission that keeps failing raises a ticket for our operations team rather than being silently dropped.

If the GP declines

The GP records the reason, the request is closed, and you are refunded. The refund is issued by our operations team rather than fired off automatically, so allow a few working days for it to reach your card. A decline usually means the safe answer needed an assessment — in which case a consultation is the right next step, not a second request.

What it costs

From €25

Prescription request, GP review, no consultation

€35 / €50

Consultation: normal hours / evenings, weekends and bank holidays

Prescription requests run from €25 to €55 depending on what is being requested, and the price for yours is shown before you enter card details. Renewing something we prescribed for you previously costs less again. No subscription, no membership fee. See full pricing.

Online doctor: how a consultation worksCertificates and letters a GP can issueGetting to a pharmacy in IrelandCan't get a GP appointment? Your options
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Repeat Prescription Questions

Can I get a repeat prescription online in Ireland?

Yes, where a GP judges it safe to issue one from what you have written. You submit a request describing the medicine you are already established on, the dose, how long you have been taking it and how the condition is; a GP registered with the Irish Medical Council reviews it and either issues the prescription or asks you to book a consultation instead. There is no video call in the standard path, which is what makes it cheaper and quicker than an appointment. What it is not is a way to start something new — that needs a consultation.

How does an online prescription actually reach my pharmacy?

Over Healthmail, the HSE-approved secure clinical email service that Irish pharmacies and GP practices use to exchange clinical documents. When the GP approves your request the platform generates a signed Irish prescription and transmits it to the Healthmail address of the pharmacy you nominated; if the first attempt fails it retries on a schedule, and a transmission that still will not go through raises a ticket for our operations team. Healthmail is the only route we use. We do not fax, we do not send prescriptions by ordinary email, and we do not hand you a file to forward yourself.

What if my pharmacy has no Healthmail address?

Then we cannot send your prescription to it electronically, and this is worth checking before you pay. Healthmail is the only transmission route we operate, so a pharmacy without an @healthmail.ie address is not reachable. Most pharmacies in Ireland do have one, but not all of them, and the coverage is not something we can look up on your behalf for every premises in the country. If you are unsure, ring your pharmacy and ask whether they receive prescriptions by Healthmail — it takes a minute and saves you a wasted request.

How long does a repeat prescription request take?

A GP is normally assigned within half an hour, and our internal target is for that GP to reach a decision within 12 hours; a request still unanswered at 18 hours is reassigned to a different doctor automatically. Many are dealt with much faster than that, but the 12-hour target is what we will commit to in writing rather than a best case dressed up as a promise. Once approved, transmission to your pharmacy is immediate — after that, how quickly your medicine is ready is a matter for the pharmacy.

What happens if the GP will not approve my request?

The GP records why and the request is closed rather than left hanging, and you are refunded. The refund is issued by our operations team rather than being fired off automatically by the doctor’s system, so it is not instant — allow a few working days for it to land back on your card. The usual reasons for a decline are that the medicine needs monitoring that has not been done, that something about the condition has changed, or that it is a first prescription rather than a renewal. In each of those cases the right next step is a consultation, where a doctor can actually assess you.

How long is an Irish prescription valid for?

Six months from the date it was written, which is the limit Irish pharmacies work to, and the platform will not resend a prescription older than that. Separately, the number of times a prescription may be repeated and the quantity supplied each time are decided by the prescribing GP and printed on the prescription itself. If you are coming back for the same medicine again, there is a minimum interval between requests so that a repeat cannot be used to accumulate more supply than was intended.

How does my pharmacy know the prescription is genuine?

Because of how it arrives rather than anything printed on it. It comes into the pharmacy’s own Healthmail account from a registered clinical address on the same secure service Irish GP practices use, and it carries the prescriber’s name and Medical Council registration number and their signature, which the pharmacist can check against the public IMC register. There is no QR code on a prescription for you to scan — that verification stamp is on sick certificates and referral letters, not on prescriptions.

Do I need an account, and do I need to be registered with a GP?

You need an account with us, because the doctor has to have somewhere to put your record, your prescription and your documents, and because you need to be able to get back to them later. You do not need to be registered with a GP practice in Ireland, and you do not need to have used us before. What we cannot do is replace a practice: we hold what you tell us and what our own doctors have written, and nothing before that, which is why a medicine needing ongoing monitoring belongs with a practice that holds your full history.

How much does a repeat prescription cost?

A prescription request starts at €25 and runs to €55 depending on what is being requested — the price for yours is shown before you pay, not after. Renewing something we prescribed for you previously costs less again. If the GP concludes you need to be assessed rather than simply renewed, a consultation is €35 Monday to Friday 8am–5pm and €50 evenings, weekends and bank holidays. There is no subscription and no membership fee.

Renew a Medicine You Are Already On

An Irish Medical Council registered GP reviews your request from €25, and sends the prescription to your pharmacy over Healthmail if it is safe to issue.

Request a PrescriptionBook a Consultation Instead