People who live in rural areas may have to wait up to half-an-hour for an ambulance compared to less than 10 minutes in other areas, a public health conference in Galway was told yesterday.
Prof Andrew Murphy said that a study for the Department of Health showed great variations in waiting times when people called an ambulance in the event of an emergency.
In urban areas there was a waiting time of up to eight minutes in almost two-thirds of cases but in rural areas a third of people had to wait up to 26 minutes.
"I would strongly suggest that rural areas be given alternative sources of alternative care", said Prof Murphy, Professor of General Practice at NUI Galway.
He said delays were particularly worrying in acute cases such as a cardiac arrest.
Prof Murphy was speaking about equity and access in the Irish health services, particularly in relation to primary care, at the conference organised by the university's Department of Health Promotion. He pointed out that in rural Donegal GPs were given defibrillators to use on patients having a cardiac arrest, rather than having to wait for an ambulance to begin treatment.
The range of services offered to those with medical cards was not wide enough. "Over 50 per cent of the GMS money is spent on drugs and 45 per cent on salaries. That does not leave money for extra services such as dietitians, counsellors, psychologists," he said.
Highlighting the State's spending on research and development, he said it was second only to Greece in the EU.
Very little money is put into primary care in Ireland, according to Prof Murphy. The problems were compounded by the fact that over 50 per cent of Irish family doctors operated single-handledly compared to around 8 per cent in the UK.