The Dispensary system within the Magherafelt Poor Law Union

In tandem with the operation of the workhouse was the provision of a dispensary system within the Magherafelt Union. The idea here was to provide medical assistance in an effort to prevent people from entering the workhouse, thereby reducing the financial burden on the ratepayers. A parliamentary report of 1841 noted that the union contained six dispensaries, which ‘are well distributed’ and ‘probably sufficient’ for the wants of the sick poor of a population of 74,542 people. The Drapers Company paid for the employment of two of the six dispensaries’ doctors, the remainder being levied on the ratepayers of the district. The 1841 report also revealed other insights into the provision of medical aid locally which was helped ‘by the benevolence of an individual’ and that ‘a few cases of fever are relieved in a cabin near Magherafelt, but the funds and the room are very limited’. Although there was a fever hospital locally, it was deemed to be insufficient in many respects, a number of patients were sent to Derry City. Several of the subscribers and medical officers within the union also gave evidence that that the lack of a proper an infirmary relief system is ‘very injurious’. These warnings would become reality when the Famine struck in 1845, bringing with it a range of diseases.