Irish Life Health’s story began in 2016 when two of Ireland’s most innovative health insurers came together to create one leading health insurance provider. Our vision is to help people live healthier lives, and we now look after the health and wellbeing of over half a million people in Ireland.
Unlike traditional health insurance, we focus on keeping our members healthy. That’s why we offer more preventative benefits than any other health insurer. And when you’re not feeling well, we still have all the benefits you’d expect with fast access to the consultants, specialists and hospitals. We endeavour to provide the services and experience that you deserve.
We are part of the Irish Life Group, one of Ireland’s leading financial services companies with over 1.4 million customers. For over 80 years, it has helped people in Ireland embrace change and build better futures through its innovative products and dedication to customer care.
1. As at 1st November 2022.
Centric Health is the largest provider of primary care services in Ireland with an ever-expanding practice network, currently 75 medical clinics, located throughout the country, supported by over 250 GPs and their clinical teams.
Centric Health has 20 years’ experience providing Primary Care services in Ireland, a strong reputation has emerged as a leader in delivering a comprehensive range of integrated primary health services to all patients. Over 500,000+ patients pass through the doors annually.
Centric Health acts as a catalyst to develop centralised group practices, in line with National HSE Primary Care Strategy, by working with and bringing together established GPs in a local community.
Dr Donal Bailey
CEO
Dr Donal Bailey has been a medical practitioner since 2009 and working in Centric Health since 2016, most recently as Director of Clinical Innovation. He is now the CEO of Care-Connect, our new care management business between Centric Health and Irish Life Health. He is a medical graduate of Trinity College Dublin, MSc Sports and Exercise Medicine 2011 from Queen Mary University London, MICGP since 2016, and Executive MBA 2017 from University College Dublin
Dr Fiona Kiernan PhD
Head of Health Economics and Outcomes Research
Dr Fiona Kiernan is the Director of Economics and Data Analytics
for Care-Connect, and is a unique hybrid of an economist and clinician. Along with her
medical degree from University College Dublin, she also holds a Masters in Health Economics,
Policy & Management from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a PhD
in Economics from University College Dublin. She practised medicine for sixteen years,
including seven years as a consultant in anaesthesiology and intensive care medicine. As an
economist she designed a pioneering funding model for intensive care patients using micro
costing methodology. In 2022 she was appointed to the State Board of the Health Products
Regulatory Authority, having previously spent five years on the State Board of the Health
Insurance Authority from 2016 to 2021.
In 2023 she was appointed to the State Board of
the National Treatment Purchase Fund, where she is the Chair of the Patient Care Committee.
Megan Smith
Head of Product and Partnerships
Megan Smith started her career in healthcare as a physiotherapist in South Africa; she has first-hand clinical experience ranging from lower income regions communities to private, state of the art facilities in Europe. Working in healthcare management and in large private insurers, Megan’s professional experience in the UK and Ireland over the past 12 years has further expanded her knowledge of the variances in patient care and health practice from multiple perspectives. Megan also holds a Master’s Degree in Medical Science and an MBA.
Aoife Coughlan PhD
Head of Operations
Dr Aoife Coughlan leads operations across our managed care teams. Aoife has over 10 years experience in clinical research and has led several clinical research programmes in Ireland’s largest paediatric hospitals. Prior to joining Centric, she was the Programme Manager for Rare Diseases at Genuity Science, which provided access to whole genome sequencing to families with rare and ultra-rare conditions. She graduated as a dietitian from University of Ulster in 2009 before completing a PhD in paediatric nutrition.
Dr Matthew Barrett
Cardiology Clinical Advisor
Matthew Barrett is a UCD graduate who completed subspecialty training in
advanced cardiovascular imaging in Northwestern Memorial Hospital Chicago. He currently works as a
consultant cardiologist with a focus on community care, eHealth and chronic disease management between
St Vincent’s Healthcare Group and HSE Community Health Organisation 6.
He is the lead for the Irish arm of the PASSION-HF research consortium focusing on development of technological
solutions to heart failure care, and is lead investigator in multiple ongoing clinical trials in automated
delivery of guideline-directed HF therapies. He is also involved in development of HF monitoring hardware.
His special areas of interest include advanced cardiac imaging, heart failure, and use of eHealth in chronic
disease management, and he has published on the use of biomarkers and home monitoring solutions in heart failure care.
Ciara Mathews
Clinical Nurse Lead
Ciara Mathews is our nurse lead for Care-Connect and has over 15 years’ experience working in the acute hospital setting. After graduating from Waterford I.T with a BSc in General Nursing, she emigrated to Canada, where she worked on an acute medical cardiology ward. Once she returned home, she has worked in various hospital settings before settling in the Emergency Dept. Ciara made the move to Centric to work as the nurse lead with the Heart Failure programme and now leads the programme with Care-Connect.
Care-Connect will blend in-person and digital clinical experiences to provide easy and convenient access to expert care and personalised health advice.
