The Federal Government wants all medical specialists to publish their fees online, but the AMA(WA) has cautioned against the move without proper consultation with the sector.
Health Minister Mark Butler announced this week that, if re-elected, the Labor Government would take action to list all specialist fees on the government’s Medical Costs Finder website.
Labor plans on putting $7million towards the project if returned to government.
“We’re done with an opt-in system,” Minister Butler told ABC Radio Perth.
“We’re going to upload all of their fees, all of the private health insurance arrangements, so that people will be able to search what ‘Doctor Smith’ charges for a knee replacement,” he said.
The website was set up by the Coalition Government in what it says was an effort to provide patients with transparency, although only a small number of specialists opted to list their fees publicly.
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Minister Butler said less than 10 individual specialists had uploaded their fees when Labor had come into government.
“Seven of them had uploaded their fees. We gave them a chance to do better than that,” he said.
“To his credit, the AMA President at the time, Steve Robson, uploaded his fees trying to lead by example, but still a few years down the track only 70 out of 11,000 have uploaded their fees.”
AMA(WA) President Dr Michael Page said the Medical Costs Finder website was launched without much consultation with the medical profession.
“I think they were hoping it would somehow drive medical out of pocket costs down, but they hadn’t really thought through exactly how it would do that,” he told Medical Forum.
“One of the major issues is that private health insurance rebates aren’t particularly transparent. There’s a lot of different private health insurers, and they’ll pay hugely different rebates on a whole lot of different conditions or procedures.
“So, we need transparency with that as well. We’d really encourage the Federal Government to force a bit of transparency out of the private health insurers in terms of what they’ll pay, because that would make it a lot easier for patients to understand what their out of pockets are going to be.”
Dr Page said while there may be the occasional specialist that overcharges “it is the exception and not the rule”.
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He said it was a complex issue with a number of factors to be considered.
“I think if the medical profession smells this as an opportunity for the government to try to drive fees down, when inflation is still going up, private health insurer rebates aren’t increasing, Medicare rebates aren’t increasing, costs are going up as in overheads for practices… we’re not going to be too keen,” Dr Page said.
“If the government’s serious about making it work, we really need to consult with the medical profession.”
Data released last year by the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed an increasing number of people were putting off seeing specialist doctors due to cost. Data also shows the cost of medical and hospital services is a key driver of health inflation for consumers, feeding into higher out of pocket costs and higher private health insurance premiums.
According to Labor fees can vary widely across specialists, even for the same procedure in the same part of Australia. In Perth, the average out of pocket cost for cataract surgery is $190, yet some patients paid less than $20, while others paid over $500.
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Dr Rachel David, chief executive of Private Healthcare Australia, which represents health funds labelled the move “a massive win for consumers” wanting more information and competition between specialist doctors.
“Paying more for a medical specialist in Australia does not guarantee better treatment or a better health outcome,” Dr David said.
“The standard of training for Australian medical specialists is very high, and to meet that standard, the great majority are providing the best of care regardless of what they charge.
“There is no correlation between high charging doctors and better quality.”
Mr Butler said the Labor Government was “committed to working with consumers, the colleges and private health providers on the design and implementation of this important cost transparency measure”.
Medical Forum contacted Shadow Health Minister Anne Ruston’s office to confirm whether the Liberal Party would match the commitment.
“The Coalition will consider the details of this announcement to ensure it will result in real benefit to Australians who are struggling under record high healthcare costs right now,” she said.
“It has never been harder or more expensive to see a doctor. This makes it more important than ever before to ensure transparent access to information about health costs.”
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