General Practitioner Services

Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 13 July 2023

Thursday, 13 July 2023

Questions (700)

David Cullinane

Question:

700. Deputy David Cullinane asked the Minister for Health to outline the number of GPs on the specialist division of the register in general practice for the years 2018 to date, broken down by year and by county; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35036/23]

Written answers

Minister for Health

The Medical Council, the statutory agency responsible for the registration and regulation of doctors in Ireland, have provided the information requested by the Deputy.

The data, below, is taken from the Medical Council’s register of medical practitioners, which is a “living” database. Each working day doctors are entered on, removed from, or transferred between the Divisions of the register.

The figures reported do not reflect the total number of doctors that may be working in general practice; as there may be doctors from other divisions (including the General Division of the register) that may be working within general practice.

Table 1 below sets out the number of General Practitioners (GPs) that retained their place on the Specialist Division of the register for the years 2018 to 2022. Doctors retaining their place on the register includes those who may not be clinically active and practicing in Ireland.

Table 1. GPs on Specialist Division, 2018-2022 (Doctors retaining their name on the register with the Specialist Division for general practice)

	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022
Total	3801	3894	3893	4028	4082

Table 2 below sets out the number of General Practitioners (GPs) on the Specialist Division of the register for the years 2018 to 2022, by year. These are GPs who are/were clinically active and practicing in Ireland (it does not include the cohort of doctors who have retained but are not clinically active/practicing).

Table 2. GPs on Specialist Division, 2018-2022 (Self-reported being clinically active)

	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022
Total	3438	3783	3717	3833	3926

Table 3 below sets out the number of General Practitioners (GPs) on the Specialist Division of the register for the years 2018 to 2022, by year and by County. These are GPs who are/were clinically active and practicing in Ireland.

Table 3. GPs on Specialist Division, 2018-2022 by County (Self-reported being clinically active and self-reported County of practice)

	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022
Carlow	42	46	44	38	41
Cavan	46	43	50	48	50
Clare	63	68	76	72	76
Cork	436	456	473	485	509
Donegal	132	139	134	136	148
Dublin	1052	1108	1146	1169	1171
Galway	239	256	271	274	280
Kerry	107	115	112	112	116
Kildare	119	124	142	138	146
Kilkenny	55	57	60	66	57
Laois	50	52	52	53	55
Leitrim	12	14	20	18	22
Limerick	163	171	168	186	186
Longford	24	22	24	26	26
Louth	88	90	91	96	95
Mayo	87	88	89	89	93
Meath	97	101	90	100	105
Monaghan	32	28	28	31	27
Offaly	45	47	40	42	50
Roscommon	45	46	45	47	50
Sligo	58	61	63	65	65
Tipperary	101	101	100	104	108
Waterford	105	104	103	110	102
Westmeath	63	68	66	67	78
Wexford	177	88	96	96	112
Wicklow	- *	97	96	104	114
Unreported **	- *	193	38	61	44
Total	3438	3783	3717	3833	3926

* Data is absent for this year, however subsequent years data is recorded.

** Indicates where a Dr has not self-reported their County of practice.