Cancer Society call for Lourdes parking charge to be scrapped

THE Irish Cancer Society has called on Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda to scrap parking charges for cancer patients.

The call comes as a new report on car parking charges at hospitals nationwide reveals that patients at the Lourdes face some of the highest costs in the country.

The report highlights the financial burden of car parking on patients and their families.

According to the findings in the ‘Park the Charges’ report, cancer patients at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda could be paying as much as €40 a day in car parking charges.

In a survey of car parking across the country, the Society found that a four hour stay in the short term car park at Our Lady of Lourdes costs patients €15, a charge which Donal Buggy, Head of Services and Advocacy at the Irish Cancer Society, described as ‘exorbitant’.

At the Crosslane Car Park, patients face a charge of €9 for the same period.

This is in excess of the average cost of a four hour stay in a Dublin hospital which costs €8.86, according to the report.

Hospitals in Munster cost an average of €6.70 for a four hour stay, while costs were lower in Connaught/Ulster at €4.67 and in Leinster (excl. Dublin) at €5.20.

Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital raised almost €500,000 in car parking charges during 2015.

The Irish Cancer Society says that the HSE needs to issue guidelines to hospitals so that all people undergoing cancer treatment receive free car parking. One cancer patient told the Irish Cancer Society that his family had spent €1,200 on car parking charges while he was in hospital.

According to figures provided by the Society, at the 26 public hospitals that offer cancer treatment, the revenue raised by car parking in 2015 totalled almost €14.5 million, with two hospitals taking in in excess of €1million, and another two hospitals taking in €1.5million and €2.9million respectively.

Donal Buggy, Head of Services and Advocacy at the Irish Cancer Society said: ‘Car parking charges represent a huge cost for many cancer patients, at a time of not just physical and psychological stress, but financial pressure. People undergoing treatment are facing real hardship in having to deal with additional costs and large drops in income, and high car parking charges only add to this. We have proposed a set of guidelines for hospitals to the HSE, that, if put in place, would make a big difference to cancer patients.’

Mr. Buggy welcomed the fact that reductions are offered to patients in Drogheda facing financial hardship, but said that ‘ this needs to be extended to all cancer patients who are already facing huge increases in day-to-day living costs. These kind of charges are hurting people who are already vulnerable financially.’