I must confess that I cannot see any benefit from the proposed Medicare copayment either as a price signal or a revenue saver. And I stress that I am loath to write off any approach to improving health care in Australia. It is difficult to think of a blunter, more chaos inducing instrument to apply to Medicare. How will it save money? Largely from committed general practices located in deprived areas – the more committed the higher the saving.
The most lucrative savings will arise from pressure on practices to accept the lower bulk billing rebate – this will save $7 per visit. Let’s face facts, GPs already do this for the majority of patients; in poorer areas GPs will have to continue to do so at a very high rate because many people will be unable to or will refuse to pay. What will we do for a 29 year old who has no income and new onset diabetes? How will we manage an infection in someone who drinks their weekly income on pay day, or a refugee who has no income. In many Aboriginal Health Clinics it will be devastating. Please imaging living in poor over crowed housing on the edge of a town or in a remote area without public transport or any other facilities, with high prices for all consumables and getting the same income as a person living in a well resourced urban area. In the NT discretionary spending may be little more than a single visit to the clinic. The $7 (plus test on costs) will be a care killer. The primary care ‘Closing the Gap’ initiative has provide free health care and has had a big impact where I work. The copayment will reverse these gains immediately. Government Ck-Ching, primary care Ck-Chang.
The safety net is a massive administrative issue – $70 a year limit for an individual ($490 for a family of 7). How on earth will this be managed? Such approaches may have worked while the money was reimbursed but this is a payment at the time of service, prior to service for many I suspect. Who will keep tabs on who has reached $70? What a nightmare. We have had Medicare fraud with sharing of Medicare cards for some time. This will certainly add to incentives to share cards, only presenting with cards that have reached the limit.
The Corporate Practices who are profit focused will be working on ways to generate the same income without adding disincentives to patients. Such practices appear to be the primary target of this copayment but I am equally sure they will be best placed to minimise the loss of income. We are likely to see a major escalation of SIP payments and payments for non-attendance items in response to this. Government will get their dollars back, but new leakage is likely to occur. Successful approaches will put pressure on surrounding practices to match them.
I am the first to admit that there is wastage in primary care and that we do more harm that we intend. I am very interested in spending Medicare dollars where it is likely to return greater benefit. I have already raised one such approach in a previous blog Saving Medicare. But I do not think that the proposed copayment will do anything but harm in many areas of this country. I would like to work with Government to come up with focused responses to the use of Medicare funds that are wasteful. Our College is the vehicle to do this and has developed the slogan #CoPayNoWay using social media – the top tweets can be found here.
Watch out – Medicare Shmedicare.
Medicine at the Deep End 