Free under-six GP care leads to big rise in visits

THE introduction of free GP care for under-sixes has led to a significant increase of more than a quarter in the number of times children visit their GP.

In 2015, all 440,000 children under six were granted free access to GP services, regardless of their family income.

A new study revealed yesterday that since the scheme’s introduction, the number of GP daytime visits by under-sixes increased by 29%, while outof-hours visits rose by 26%.

The study was carried out by researchers at Trinity College Dublin, who examined visitation data from eight GP practices in north Dublin and the local out-of-hours service, Northdoc. While there was a rise in both daytime and outof-hours visits across all age groups, children under six made up 45% of additional daytime GP visits and 73% of extra out-of-hours services visits.

The leading author of the study, Dr Michael O’Callaghan, said was no surprise GP services were used more often when free. ‘This study shows conclusively that large numbers of additional children availed of GP services and availed of these services more often once they gained free access,’ Dr O’Callaghan said.

‘Our study also demonstrates the knock-on effect of the under-sixes contract in the out-of-hours service, which experienced a disproportionately large spike in numbers of children under six attending.’

‘As we’ve no reason to believe the cohort experienced more ill health in the second year of the study, we can conclude the large increases were simply as a result of the introduction of free GP care.’

Commenting on the findings, Professor Tom O’Dowd of Trinity said: ‘This study shows that workload planning is required when any changes to GP access are made. If not, access to frontline GP services will be undermined for everyone.’