Cork and Kerry set to lose between 60 and 80 GPs over next five years 

A Cork-based director of the Irish College of General Practitioners (ICGP) has said that between 60 and 80 Cork and Kerry GPs are due to retire within five years — up to four times the figure provided to The Echo by the HSE.

The HSE says its figures refer only to the GPs who deal with medical card patients, but ICGP director Diarmuid Quinlan says the vast majority of GPs deal with medical card patients.

The focus on the number of GPs working in Ireland comes following a recent report on GP supply and demand, published by the Department of Health.

The report suggests that GP retirements in several counties will put services at risk, where there is no viable replacement for them.

Dr Quinlan’s estimate of 60-80 doctors retiring is much higher than the latest projection of 18 Cork and Kerry GPs approaching retirement in the next five years provided to The Echo by HSE South West. The HSE later clarified that its figure of 18 retirees related to GPs in Cork/Kerry who dealt with medical card holders.

Medical card patients 

However, Dr Quinlan said the vast majority of GPs dealt with medical card patients.

“Many GPs work in a practice where somebody else holds the medical card contract and other doctors see the patients, and that’s absolutely fine — the vast majority of GPs see both and most GPs who are working in practices will see and treat people with medical cards.

“All you need is one doctor in the practice with a medical card contract and then the patients come and they get seen, and the State pays for that service,” said Dr Quinlan.

“Maybe there will be 18 doctors who will reach their 72nd birthday in the next five years in Cork and Kerry, but I would think that most of us would feel — do you really want your GP to be working until they’re 72?”

He said that according to the ICGP data, there were 600 GPs in Ireland aged 65 and over, and 300 of these were more than 70 years of age.

Based on Cork and Kerry’s population share, he said that one eighth of these were in Cork and Kerry — a figure of between 60 and 80.

“We have very good granular data — it’s reasonable to assume that within the next three to four years — in the lifetime of this Government — the majority of that 600 will have retired,” he said.

Population increase

Dr Quinlan added that some areas, including Midleton, where there had been a substantial population increase, had benefited from an ICGP rural GP programme for international medical graduates.

“We have placed three GPs in the Midleton area through that programme,” he said.

“We [the Irish College] are working with the HSE to support rural communities by providing timely access to GP care.”

He said Cork was better placed than other regions in terms of the number of GPs per 100,000 of the population.

“Cork has about 90 GPs per 100,000, Kilkenny has about 55,” he pointed out, suggesting that the total for Cork was around the 500 mark.

“The good news is that we have rapidly and very substantially expanded the number of GP training places — 10 years ago it was 155, now it’s 350 — so it’s gone up very substantially. That’s very welcome and is a result of the collaboration of the ICGP and HSE.

“In that time, however, our population has expanded substantially as well in the last decade, and we now have a longer life expectancy.

“In 2019, we had 700,000 people aged 65 over, by the end of 2024 that was 830,000, and we expect it to exceed 1m by 2030.

“These older people consume — and rightly so — large amounts of GP expertise, and need a lot of GP care.”

Training

Dr Quinlan said there are approximately 1,100 GPs in training at the moment. He said there were also substantial risks and challenges facing young GPs, including the housing crisis, and the cost of commercial premises.

Dr Quinlan described the contribution of GP nurses as “huge” and said that the ICGP was working with the HSE locally to investigate the enabling of GP nurses to work safely and effectively in general practice.