All medical services use the Commonwealth Medicare Benefits Schedule to derive their fee. Your anaesthetic fee is separate from any other fee you may incur for any surgery or procedure you are to have eg. hospital, surgical, pathology, radiology etc.
The Australian Medical Association (AMA) sets guidelines as to the level of fees that an anaesthetist can charge. All anaesthetists with the Victorian Anaesthetic Group do not exceed the level as set by the AMA. Similar to surgical fees, an anaesthetic fee is determined by the individual anaesthetist.
Each anaesthetic account is determined by:
Generally speaking the larger and more complex the operation, the more anaesthetic components will be involved, and therefore, the larger the anaesthetic fee will be.
Many accounts will have a co-payment requirement. A co-payment is an additional fee to the anaesthetist that is a non-refundable ‘out of pocket’ expense. It may also be known as the ‘gap payment’ – similar to ‘excess’ for any other insurance (car, house etc) that you are required to pay if making an insurance claim.
Your anaesthetist will determine the amount and how and if the co-payment is applied. The balance of the account will be then sent to your health fund.
For those patients that are covered by:
There will not be any out of pocket expense. These accounts will be invoiced directly to the third party and you will not receive an account of any type.
You will need to pay your account in full prior to surgery if you are:
Payment of Accounts:
Following surgery you will receive an account from our office that will itemise the anaesthetic that you have had.
Itemised accounts: You can either pay the account in full to our office by methods as outlined on the invoice, alternatively take the account to Medicare and your health insurance company. Once you have received cheques from Medicare and your health insurance company, they then need to be forwarded to our office ASAP together with your out of pocket payment.
Non itemised accounts: You will need to pay your account upon receipt of account.
Estimate of fees: Should you want to know the ‘out of pocket’ estimated expense that you are expected to pay, please phone the office on 03 9509 2131.
To obtain an estimate you will be required to have the following details:
For those overseas patients that do not have a Medicare card, you will be expected to pay the full fee and then may claim through your own private insurers.