A $7 fee for Medicare services could add hundreds of dollars to what families spend each year on healthcare and make it more difficult for GPs to manage patients with complex chronic conditions.
From July next year, the federal government is proposing that patients pay $7 for each GP visit, pathology service or X-ray.
While contributions for concession card holders and children are capped at $70 per person per year, there is no limit to how many times other families can be required to pay the fee. Families receiving Family Tax Benefit Part A are entitled to some relief for their out of pocket costs after they spend $700 in a year, but the $7 fee does not count towards this threshold.
Data collected by researchers at the University of Sydney for the Bettering the Evaluation and Care of Health program shows almost a quarter of GP visits result in pathology or diagnostic imaging tests being ordered.
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Helena Britt, director of the family medicine research centre at the university’s school of public health, said such tests were crucial to help doctors care for patients with multiple chronic conditions.
”We’ve had people in our study with 16 diagnosed chronic conditions,” she said. ”You’ve got multiple pharmaceutical products and other treatments going on. They all have to be kept an eye on. But if the patient can’t see really why they need to have the pathology tests done, and it’s another $7 cost – that’s $14 in all, then maybe they just won’t go and have the tests.”
Dr Britt said she was ”deeply concerned” about the impact the new charges would have on families with children. ”We’re told it’s only $7 per visit. Mother goes along with three children. That’s 4 x 7 = $28. Plus one of them has pathology, that’s $35, not just $7. And considering a lot of people have limited funds available, including those on a pension, I don’t quite know how they’re going to afford that.”
With three young children, aged four, two and one-week, Sophie Brettell, an archaeologist, said the $7 fee could add $280 to her medical bills each year. In the past three months she has visited her Ashfield bulk-billing doctor at least once a fortnight and makes about 20 trips to the GP each year.
”If my four-year-old complains about a sore throat, then paying $7 would make me more reluctant to go to the doctor. I’d probably leave it at least a week before going in,” she says.
Her oldest child, Henry, had a double ear-infection last month, but a $7 payment might have deterred her from making follow-up appointments. ”He needed three courses of antibiotics and ended up with bronchiolitis and tonsillitis. If I had to pay, we might not have done as many visits, which could be dangerous.”
From January, general patients could also have to pay $5 more for prescription medicines, while concessional patients will pay 80¢ more.
”You can’t say we have a universal healthcare system when any sort of GP payment will exclude people in financial stress, especially people with big families,” Ms Brettell said.
Source: Sydney Morning Herald