Children Under 6

We at Owenabue Medical Centre have signed to provide this service of free GP care to Children of our practice aged 6 years and under.

Due to capacity issues we will only be in a position to sign children who are already patients of our practice.

While we understand and support removing the financial barrier to consulting when your child is unwell there is widely expressed concern that this scheme will result in a large increase in consultations for milder illness best managed at home.

Our concern is that the allocation of appointments for minor complaints previously managed by you at home will result in those most ill and with most medical need young and old being unable to access an appointment.

We have every confidence that appointment requests will be made responsibly as you have always done and we will make every effort to see your child as promptly as possible.

Anticipating the increase requirement for appointments which is undisputed we at Owenabue Medical Centre will be taking on a new GP and also carrying out renovations to the premises.

We will also make essential changes to our appointment system.

It will be possible to book a routine appointment for your child in advance for non-emergency problems e.g. issues they have had for a while or check- ups regarding medicines or if they are not very unwell but you have a concern or question for us. There will be a certain number of these routine appointments daily and when they are full you will be offered the next available appointment. While we hope that there will be as little wait as possible the reality is that this new Under 6’scheme will result in longer wait times for appointments. This is unavoidable and we have expressed this concern to the HSE.

There will be a certain number of same day urgent appointments available for urgent cases only. This is when your child has a new pain or illness that needs immediate management. If you have such a problem we need you to call and explain this to our reception staff.

These same day urgent appointments will be for seeing one child and addressing the one urgent issue only. If you have more than 1 child who needs to be seen you need to book each child seperately.

Due to time constraints if you bring another child they will not be seen if they are not booked in.

It will be necessary to re-schedule another appointment if there are other issues to attend to.

A choice of doctor will not be available for urgent appointments as one doctor will be allocated this responsibility each day.

We feel that this new appointment system will ensure your child’s health care needs are addressed in the most safe and timely manner. We appreciate your co-operation and feedback.

Your child is covered for care under the scheme once you have received confirmation and their number from the HSE.

The scheme begins on July 1st 2015.

You have to register to be covered if you have not registered each child seperately they are not covered under the scheme.

What does the scheme include:

The Scheme covers appointments in Owenabue Medical Centre between 9am and 5 pm.

Outside of these hours a consultation is considered an emergency.

The HSE specify that an emergency means “a circumstance where a child’s consultation is un- foreseen, non-routine and necessary to be carried out after hours and cannot be safely deferred until normal contracted hours resume”

Also The HSE has stated that the Under 6 free GP care Scheme does not cover attendance outside 9am to 5pm “merely to facilitate the preference of the Child patient or his/her parent(&/or Guardian(s)”and if “the patient did not require urgent treatment from the Medical Practitioner”

In the event of an Out of Hours emergency please contact South Doc as you have always done on: 1850 335999

The Scheme covers all the acute medical needs of your Under 6 child.

At approximately age 2 years and age 5 years your child will be measured and weighed.

If your child is asthmatic aged between 2 years and 6 years this scheme will cover a review 3 months after diagnosis to assess how your child and you are managing and a yearly review to age 6 years to assess control and inhaler use.

Unfortunately the Scheme does not cover certain items such as form fillling and these will still incur a small charge.

This is a new Scheme introduced by the HSE. We at Owenabue Medical Centre will endeavour to make this work for you and your child but are clear that this will requires change for all staff, General Practitioners and for you as a patient.

We appreciate your support.

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Dr Carolyn Wallace             Dr Eimear Mc Carthy           Dr Vivian Foley