Relief in sight for hospital visitors
Thankfully relief may be in sight for the many burdened with excessive charges for hospital parking.
In this regard, Our Lady of Lourdes hospital, came top of the list in a recent survey that found patients and visitors are paying higher daily charges.
Nationwide in excess of €22.4m. a year is collected in the unpopular parking charges, and the charges, dubbed a ‘ tax on the sick’ have been criticised for putting patients and families into financial hardship.
The constant complaints about the charges led to the Minister for Health, Simon Harris to order a review in 2018 of hospital car parking charges, and that review has made a number of recommendations, with the overall objective of reducing the economic costs of hospital attendance for patients and visitors without disportitionally compromising the funding available for patient care.
One of the main complaints, frequently voiced by people in this area, about the Lourdes Hospital parking charges, is the failure of management to offer more discounts and multi-day passes.
This failure particularly applies to families visiting a seriously ill relative in hospital on a daily basis for weeks on end, and on the occasions when they have to remain with a gravely ill patient for the best part of the day.
It is particularly annoying for those living in the Dundalk area, for many will recall when the campaign to resist the downgrading of the Louth County Hospital in favour of the Lourdes Hospital, the argument was advanced by HSE executives and others, that Drogheda was only 20 minutes down the motorway, and that this would not entail any real hardship for patients or visitors.
No one pointed out at that time that in addition to the cost of travel, visitors and patients would be arm locked into parking charges that are now found to be the most expensive in the country.
No explanation has been forthcoming as to why Our Lady of Lourdes hospital has come out on top of that survey which also revealed that daily charges in Drogheda could, on occasions, reach €40 for visitors and patients.
Understandably the charges will not be eliminated but it is expected that the onus will be placed on hospital management to offer more discounts and multi-day passes, with the recommendation that charges do not exceed €10 a day in parking charges.
Currently discussions are under way on the recommendations contained in the survey and it is expected that the 2020 estimates will include the cost of implementing the recommendations.
They cannot come quickly enough for those left with no option but to use the car park at the Lourdes on a regular basis, for families visiting seriously ill relatives do not need the extra stress because of the pressure on their resources of having to pay out perhaps over €100 a week in parking charges over the duration of their relatives stay in hospital.