WA still stuck in the waiting room for bulk-billed appointments

[Pelican Press 0]

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WA still stuck in the waiting room for bulk-billed appointments

Western Australia is still at the back of the ****** when it comes to landing a bulk-billed doctor’s appointment, with the State recording the lowest rate of subsidised visits in the country.

New data to be released by the Federal Government on Monday revealed an improved 77.3 per cent of all GP visits nationally were covered by Medicare.

All States including WA — which has been grappling with record-low rates of bulk-billed appointments — recorded a higher proportion of covered visits since October 2023.

Proportionally visits are on the up, but the data suggests West Australians are still more likely to be out of pocket after a check-up than any other area, other than *********** Capital Territory.

New numbers show 70 per cent of all GP appointments in the past 12 months in WA were bulk billed, compared with 68.4 per cent 12 months ago — which works out at about an additional 288,000 visits.

In New South Wales however, 81.9 per cent of doctor’s appointments were bulk billed while in Victoria the rate was 78.2 per cent, Queensland 75.6 per cent, followed by South Australia at 74.5 per cent.

Data released in May suggested that less than one in 10 GP clinics across WA were fully bulk billing, prompting *********** Medical Association WA president Michael Page to call subsidised appointments as being at an an all-time low.

“Many GPs simply can’t afford to bulk-bill and have their practices be viable so something still needs to be done to improve medicare rebates for patients to keep general practice thriving,” he said at the time.

In October, a Royal *********** College of General Practitioners (RACGP) Health of the Nation survey found that there had been a staggering rise in the number of people delaying medical appointments, or choosing not to see a doctor at all, largely due to the cost.

To try to tackle the national issue and on the back of a promise to make the health system a priority, the Federal Government has increased rebates, planned to open 87 Medicare urgent care clinics and paid for the training of 4,800 new GPs between 2023 and 2025 to address a sizeable skills gap.

Health Minister Mark Butler acknowledged there was “more work to do but we are seeing things turn around”.

“Bulk billing was in free fall when we came to Government,” he said.

“We’ve got more doctors, we’ve got more bulk billing, and we’ve got Medicare Urgent Care Clinics that have already seen more than 850,000 patients, all fully bulk billed”.

The Minister’s office estimated the investment had created an additional “103,000 bulk billed visits to the GP every week, on average, or over 5.4 million additional bulk billed visits”.

According to a survey of thousands of doctors under the RACGP cited by the Federal Government, the investment has been a “game changer” and allowed them to bulk bill more patients, more often.

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