Surprising figure revealed in car parking income at MUH
Car parking income at MUH dropped sharply in 2023.
The car park income at Mayo University Hospital (MUH) dropped by close to €30,000 last year.
Castlebar-based Independent Cllr Michael Kilcoyne posed a question about car parking at the hospital at a recent meeting of the Regional Health Forum. He asked how many HSE car parks are in Mayo and Galway and the location of each as well as the income from each location between 2020 and 2023.
In 2020, the car parking income at MUH was €118,736. The impact of Covid-19 saw that figure drop to just €60,810 in 2021 before rising to €132,152 in 2022 and falling sharply in 2023 to €103,285.
Meanwhile, car parking income at the four fee-paying car parks at Galway University Hospital rose year-on-year. In 2023, more than €1m was generated. Oncology patients, renal dialysis patients, and frequent paediatric patients are exempt from charges.
“Mayo University Hospital [parking revenue] dropped by close to 20% from 2022 to 2023. The number of patients certainly didn’t go down,” said Cllr Kilcoyne.
Ann Cosgrove, Chief Operations Officer with the Saolta hospital group, said “technical reasons” saw car parking income drop at MUH.
“There was a very specific technical issue around it in Mayo for a few months which definitely would have impacted in terms of managing the system,” said Ms Cosgrove.
She highlighted the fact that Galway has four fee-paying car parks.
“It’s to do with volume really and numbers coming through and Mayo has one fee-paying car park,” said Ms Cosgrove.
Cllr Kilcoyne said he understands work on the car park at MUH is scheduled this year.
“I think the car park is out of order, it’s going to be done again in 2024.”
Meanwhile, it was revealed to Cllr Kilcoyne that in 2022 and 2023 a total of 133 patients in Mayo availed of treatment in Northern Ireland, funded by the HSE. Patients may access healthcare outside the State funded by the HSE via a number of schemes e.g. Treatment Abroad Scheme (TAS), the Cross Border Directive (CBD) and the Northern Ireland Planned Healthcare Scheme (NIPHS). The HSE could not provide figures on Mayo patients who accessed treatments in other countries.
