The 1842 Ordnance Survey six-inch map labels it plainly as a fever hospital, a designation that places its origins in an era of recurring epidemic disease in rural Ireland. By the time the surveyors returned for the 1904 and 1935 editions, the same building had been reclassified as a dispensary, reflecting a shift in how local medical provision was organised and named, though the structure itself appears to have changed little.

The building is gable-ended with chimneys set into the gables, a sensible arrangement for heating separate rooms or wards along the length of the structure. The west-facing front presents three bays, with a central door topped by a rectangular light, and bi-partite sash windows that still retain their original glazing bars, the small wooden divisions that subdivide each window pane. That these glazing bars survive in an otherwise roofless and abandoned structure is a small architectural curiosity in itself. A single-storey addition at the rear, also without a roof, suggests the building was extended at some point, perhaps as demand on its services grew. Fever hospitals of this period were typically built at a remove from village centres, both to limit contagion and because they were regarded with considerable anxiety by local populations, which may explain its position out in open ground rather than along a street.