Health Minister Edwin Poots has outlined how the health service will be impacted by potential cuts in a paper seen by the BBC.
The paper shows that cuts could restrain pay for health sector staff, lower the number of agency staff and reduce spending on home care packages.
The cuts could also affect the Transforming Your Care programme of health service reforms.
Mr Poots has said his department faces a £140m shortfall.
The paper indicates a range of measures that the Department of Health may implement in response to budget restraints from Stormont.
It lists possible savings of nearly £15m under pay restraint of staff, but warns of the potential for industrial action by health care unions.
It also indicates that spending on locum doctors could fall by 50% for six months, saving a possible £9m but requiring changes to rotas across hospitals to ensure enough doctors are on-call.
'Millions'The Transforming Your Care programme would also lose £9m.
The paper also shows that millions would be taken away from care packages for the elderly and there would be less money for drug therapies for conditions such as cancer, arthritis and multiple sclerosis (MS).
The cuts would also stop the development of a round-the-clock cardiac unit at Altnagelvin Hospital and significantly affect funding to treat those with sexually transmitted diseases.
On Wednesday, the health minister said the paper would outline the cuts required to keep the health department within budget restraints.
He said: "Many of these decisions are so controversial that no single minister could make it."
Paper outlines potential health cuts
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