Each of the four regional NHS systems use General Practitioners (GPs) to provide  primary healthcare and to make referrals to further services as necessary.  Hospitals then provide more specialist services, including care for patients  with psychiatric illnesses, as well as direct access to Accident and  Emergency (A&E) departments. Pharmacies (other than those within  hospitals) are privately owned but have contracts with the relevant health  service to supply prescription drugs. Each public healthcare system also provides free ambulance services for emergencies, when patients need the specialist transport  only available from ambulance crews or when patients are not fit to travel home  by public transport. These services are generally supplemented when necessary by  the voluntary ambulance services. In addition, patient  transport services by air are provided by the Scottish Ambulance Service in  Scotland and elsewhere by county or regional air ambulance trusts (sometimes  operated jointly with local police helicopter services) throughout  England and Wales. In specific  emergencies, emergency air transport is also provided by naval, military and air  force aircraft of whatever type might be appropriate or available on each  occasion. Each NHS system also provides dental services through private dental  practises and dentists can only charge NHS patients at the set rates for each  country. Patients opting to be treated privately do not receive any NHS funding  for the treatment. About half of the income of dentists in England comes from  work sub-contracted from the NHS, however not all  dentists choose to do NHS work. source: Wikipedia January 2012. This article is free for use healthcare in the United Kingdom Healthcare in the UK is devolved, meaning England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales each have their own systems of private and publicly-funded healthcare, together  with alternative, holistic and complementary  treatments. Each country has different policies and priorities has resulted  in a variety of differences existing between the systems. That said, each country provides public healthcare to all UK  permanent residents that is free at the point of need, being paid for from  general taxation. In addition, each also has a private healthcare sector which  is considerably smaller than its public equivalent, with provision of private  healthcare acquired by means of private health insurance, funded as part of an  employer funded healthcare scheme or paid directly by the customer, though  provision can be restricted for those with conditions such as AIDS/HIV. Taken together, the World Health Organization, in 2000,  ranked the provision of healthcare in the United Kingdom as fifteenth best in Europe and eighteenth in the world. Overall, around 8.4  per cent of the UK's gross domestic product is spent on  healthcare, which is 0.5% below the Organization  for Economic Co-operation and Development average and about one percent  below the average of the European Union. Most healthcare in England is provided by the National Health Service  (NHS), England's publicly funded healthcare system, which  accounts for most of the Department of Health's  budget. The  actual delivery of health care services is presently managed by ten Strategic Health Authorities  and, below this, locally accountable trusts (e.g. Primary  Care Trusts- PCTs) and other bodies.