New GP approved for Birr

A new GP has been approved by the HSE to start in Birr.

Local Councillor John Carroll warmly welcomed the news.

“The HSE executive Joe Ruane told us in a recent Birr Municipal District meeting,” said Cllr Carroll, “that the number of GPs we have in Birr is adequate. That may be so, but an extra GP in the town will be a boost for us all.”

During the recent Birr MD meeting the councillors asked Mr Ruane for an update on the capacity of GPs in the town to take additional patients.

The following was Mr Ruane's response, which included a number of interesting statistics:

“The number of GPs in Birr has remained steady over the years (from 2006 to the present date). There are currently no GMS GP vacancies in the Birr area. (The GMS scheme is the General Medical Services Scheme which covers the Medical Card and the GP Visit Card.) The HSE is not aware of upcoming retirements in 2022.”

Mr Ruane did add however that there is likely to be “a slight increase (one to two GPs) in the number of GPs in the near future as we have had a number of recent queries from individual GPs in relation to the application process for a GMS contract.”

He pointed out that a GMS panel is frozen on reaching 2,200 patients which is the maximum permissible under the GMS scheme. No GP in the Birr area has exceeded this limit and therefore no panels are currently frozen.

The average panel size of three GPs in Birr is 1,285 per GP, while one GP has just in excess of 2,000 patients. This figure is likely to be reduced with the addition of new GPs to the area.

“Birr is in line with other towns in the Midlands in terms of the number of GPs as a proportion of the entire population, i.e. both private and GMS.

“Consequently we in the HSE believe that the population of Birr is well served with the number of GPs in the area and we are satisfied that that there is capacity to maintain services and to take on additional medical card patients.” Despite this, he added, the HSE wasn't ruling out taking on an additional GP.

“Covid 19 placed additional pressure on general practices,” he continued, “particularly with the increased need for telephone consultation, reduced capacity for face to face consultations in line with social distancing guidelines, increased workload associated with administration of vaccinations, referrals, etc, and resulting absenteeism of GPs and practice staff arising from Covid relation sick leave / isolation requirements.”

He showed the councillors the following “Birr GP analysis”:

Year: 2006. Number of practices / GPs : 3 practices / 4 GPs. Population 5,081.

Year 2016: 4 practices / 5 GPs Population 5,741

Year 2021: 3 practices / 4 GPs. Population 5,741.

There is one panel with just over 2,000 and the average of three remaining panels is 1,285.

In Edenderry there are 6 GPs (with a population of 7,359). In Tullamore there are 13 GPs with a population of 14,607.
Mr Ruane praised the GPs for working so well throughout the challenging period of the pandemic. “But for the vaccination programme the omicron wave would have been more challenging.”

“We expect,” he added, “that it's likely that another GP will come to Birr in the next couple of years.”

Cllr John Leahy said we are fortunate to have GPs who want to work in Birr. Some of them are carrying on a family tradition in doctoring in Birr, he said.