A provider for WA’s second Medicare Urgent Care Clinic has been selected.
The Minister for Health and Aged Care, Mr Mark Butler, announced on 2 June 2023 that Rockingham Medical and Dental Centre will become the next UCC and will begin seeing patients from 30 June 2023.
“The Rockingham UCC will be open extended hours, seven days a week, with urgent care fully bulkbilled. You will be able to walk in and see a doctor or nurse and access imaging and pathology services,” Mr Butler said.
“The clinic will ease pressure on the Rockingham General Hospital, allowing them to concentrate on higher priority emergencies.”
Just under half of all presentations to hospital emergency departments in WA are for semi and non-urgent conditions.
The Rockingham UCC announcement follows the announcement that the Rudloc Road Medical & Dental in Morley will be an UCC, and work is under way to establish a further five clinics in Joondalup, Murdoch, Midland, Bunbury and Broome.
“The Australian Government will continue to work closely with the WA Government and WA Primary Health Alliance to deliver the remaining Medicare UCCs, all of which are planned to open in 2023,” Mr Butler said.
The Minister was also spruiking the success of the Albanese Government’s cheaper medicines policy, highlighting that Australians have saved almost $100 million in just five months, off nearly nine million prescriptions after the maximum co-payment on the PBS was reduced from $42.50 to $30 on 1 January 2023.
“Close to a million Australians go without vital medicines each year because of their cost – cheaper medicines are not just good for patients’ hip pocket, but it’s also good for their health,” he said.
West Australian patients had saved $11,092,276 on 1,009,342 prescriptions as of 31 May 2023.
In other Government news, from 1 June 2023, Australians with endometrial cancer and Lennox-Gastaut syndrome – a rare and severe form of epilepsy that usually occurs in children aged three to five years – will have access to new treatment options through the PBS.
Pembrolizumab (Keytruda®) and lenvatinib (Lenvima®) will be expanded for use in combination to treat patients with advanced endometrial cancer whose disease continues to progress after prior therapy.
Nearly 320 women each year will benefit from this listing and without the subsidy, could pay more than $170,000 per course of treatment.
Cannabidiol (Epidyolex®) will also be expanded on the PBS to treat seizures associated with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome in patients who have not achieved adequate seizure control with at least two other anti-epileptic drugs.
Almost 1,150 Australians will benefit from this listing, with the medicine costing more than $28,000 per year.