Chair of the General Practitioners' Committee of the Irish Medical Organisation has said it does not want to set dates on when the scheme for free GP care for under-sixes will be introduced.
Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Keelin Shanley, Ray Walley said talks were progressing on the introduction of the scheme.
Dr Walley said there were no sticking points in the talks, and the IMO was engaging in a professional manner.
He said the IMO was ensuring at all times that what it could provide is within the resources that are there.
"I don't want to be giving dates, I don't want to be changing where we are with things, but basically it is a professional engagement and we are progressing", he said.
Asked about the fact that the National Association of General Practitioners has now obtained a negotiating licence, Dr Walley said this had not changed the IMO's focus as a trade union.
Earlier doctors who work in hospital emergency departments rejected claims by GPs that patients who should be admitted to hospital are instead being sent home.
The claims were made last weekend at the annual general meeting of the National Association of General Practitioners.
In a statement, the Irish Association of Emergency Medicine said the public could be assured that decisions to discharge patients are taken only when it is safe to do so and after a series of tests and assessments.
To suggest that patients are routinely sent home without adequate assessment was unfair and misleading to patients and their families, it said.
