Patients wrongly slugged hospital fees sparks review

SICK and injured Victorians may have been wrongly billed for seeking urgent medical help at country hospitals and could be owed thousands of dollars.

The Victorian Government has ordered the Department of Health and Human Services to investigate whether urgent care centres across country Victoria have broken national funding rules that protect patients and free healthcare.

A review was ordered after it was last week revealed patients who had presented to Colac Area Health’s urgent care, including a heart-attack victim, had been charged $60 for their visit.

Similar urgent care centres in Nhill, Benalla, Casterton and Ararat have also charged patients for treatment, which it’s believed could have also occurred at up to 16 public hospi- tals. Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt and Rural Health Minister Bridget McKenzie wrote to their state counterpart, Jill Hennessy, at the weekend requesting an urgent review into the system.

“We are concerned that rural and regional Victorians accessing public hospitals are being unfairly disadvantaged when compared to other people accessing the care in public hospitals in our cities,” the letter says.

There are about 50 urgent care centres at Victorian rural hospitals supported by local doctors on-call that provide different levels of emergency care.

While some provide care for minor injuries and illness many provide initial resuscitation and life support before patients are transferred to nearby larger hospitals.

National funding agreements ban public urgent care centres charging for services that they themselves provide, such as treatment by their own doctors, but patients can be charged when external providers, such as GPs or a pathology service, are called in to provide expert care on-site.

The Rural Doctors Association of Australia has raised concerns about the model, which is unique to Victoria, claiming it is putting GPs in “awkward” and “unfair” positions. RDAA chief executive Peta Rutherford said rural GPs had expressed concerns about the way urgent care centres were operating but repeated attempts to meet with the government had failed.

“Any attempts to save money when it comes to emergency treatment should never come at the cost of the patients,” Ms Rutherford said.

Ms Hennessy last week requested Colac Area Health to cease charging patients at its urgent care centre.