WIMMERA residents could have to pay for procedures such as pap smears, blood tests and x-rays under changes to bulk billing.
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The federal government announced in its mid-year budget update it would cut bulk-billing incentive payments for pathology services, including pap smears, blood tests and urine tests, from July 1.
It says these changes - and changes to bulk billing for MRI scans and other imaging services – will save $650 million over four years.
Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia president Michael Harrison said the move would force patients to pay at least $30 for a pap smear, because previous government cuts had made it difficult for laboratories to absorb added costs.
However, Member for Lowan Emma Kealy believes the claims were misleading and took to her Facebook page to clarify the issue.
“I’d like to reassure Australian women there are no changes proposed to the cost of a pap smear,” she said.
“Nor is there any reduction in the dollar-value of the Medicare rebate a patient receives to undertake pathology tests.
”This confusions has unfortunately come about due to some misleading claims about changes to an inefficient payment that is made directly to pathologists, not to patients.
“However, some are trying to sell this change as a cut to the value of your Medicare rebate, which is not true.”
A spokesman for Health Minister Sussan Ley said the government was not proposing to cut rebates, but rather it wanted to cut an inefficient payment – worth between $1.40 and $3.40 – that is paid direct to pathology corporations separate to the Medicare rebate".
“It is therefore not part of the patient’s Medicare rebate, as some have tried to claim,” he said.
“Alleged claims by pathologists about the potential cost of raising their prices are also misleading, because they have omitted the value of the Medicare rebate a patient receives from the government to help cover this very cost.”
Australian Medical Association president Brian Owler said the changes would lead to pathology services passing increased medical costs to consumers.
"When the government make these announcements, they don't talk to anyone," he said.
"They don't talk to pathologists, they don't talk to doctors, they just make these announcements and then they wonder why everyone gets upset."
The government had previously announced it will phase out pap smears from 2017, in favour of human papillomavirus testing.
More than 150,000 people have signed an online petition demanding that pap smears remain free.
