Advice please! Is health insurance necessary or is Medicare enough?

[NottsMum]

I've been in Perth for 10 weeks now and having got most of the other necessary stuff out of the way, DH and I have been talking over whether we should get health insurance. He says no, I say yes but only because I'm worried about dentist bills. Advice anyone?

Is it expensive?

You can get 'top-up' insurance. I think the general consensus is that most do.

Or let me put it another way. When I lived in Australia it cost me £170 dollars to go and see a gynaecologist for a check-up that I need every year. Medicare gave me back £90 dollars......

for us it is - but dh and dd1 have heart conditions etc. We get a fair bit back after dh has his annual check up and dd1 gets hers done through the hospital. Dental - dd1 is covered as she has a health care card BUT the rest of us are not.

We have looked into it and it is expensive for us ( as a family) but we need everything - hospital and extras. If you are worried about dentist then you could just get the extras one that covers dentist etc but not hospital.

From a tax perspective it is also a good idea. If you don't take out private there are ramifications, which get worse as you get older. I find that as a single I at least had ancillary for optical and dental, but with kids I kind of like to have it for just in case I want to pick our own doctor if things get serious. It can be a complex issue ...

Hmmm. Still totally undecided. Does Medicare cover children for dental and eye checks? The reason I mentioned dental was that both me and DH have had an annual scrape and polish with our UK dentist and I've heard that here it's mega expensive even to get a check up. What kind of costs would we be looking at for that.

Out of interest, how much does it cost to go and see the GP? I've only been with my DDs when I had to get their red books checked by the local GP, so their visit was free of charge.

we pay $48 dollars to see GP and get 32.10 back from Medicare.

Eye tests I think are covered by Medicare - not sure if glasses etc are - think perhaps the lenses might be - but don't quote me.

children are not covered for dental - the only reason dd1's gets it for free is that she has a health care card due to her disability.

We have private health insurance. We pay $156 a month for hospital cover with $250 excess and the top extras cover you can get.

ds goes to speech therapy $50 a week and we get $28 back from private health (not covered medicare), I got two pairs glasses $410 and got $220 back and the dc go to dentist every 6 months which costs around $176 for checkup and clean. We could not afford all of this without private health.

Also, if you earn over $50000 and not in private health you pay $500 Medicare levy in your tax, if you are in private health you don't pay it. So there is $500 towards private cover.

Each to their own really. Our dc have had various health probs over years, grommets etc, and I don't want to wait a year for an operation, I would rather choose the Dr and do it straight away. I see private health as a necessity rather than a luxury.

ok, rant over.

Forgot to add that we get $120 back for dentist visit.

For day to day gp stuff Medicare is fine. If you have other health issues I would advise private health. We know dd and ds1 are going to need braces in next three years. At $5000 each we could not do this alone.

mymamma - who are you with? I know the ones dh looked for us were really expensive and we need the hospital cover with the possibility of two lots of cardiac surgery in our future.

having said that - we seem to luck out with the consultants dd1 has for her health care - they are fab.

eidsvold we are with NRMA Health.

If you have a look online you can tick and flick your choices of what things you want included. When your dh looked it might have been more expensive because you were still considering your dd3 and wanted antenatal care.

We wanted speech, optical, dental and a couple of other things, where you may want cardiac care and such. You get quoted the price for your cover immediately online.

hello NottsMum - Long time no hear, how are you?

I was just wondering about this yesterday.

We are due to make the move to Brisbane in December/January.

I have read about the Lifetime Health Cover - do any of you subscribe to this?

We are in lifetime health cover. Up to each individual family what you choose to do. We need dentist, optometrist and speech therapy. These are not covered by public system for us.

If you don't have private health cover you have to be prepared to wait for operations etc. You have to be low income with a health card, I think under $30000, to see public dentist otherwise you are not eligible and will have to go privately with nothing back from Medicare.

mymama - dd1 gets a health care card as she has a disability. We access speech therapy and from next year will need to pay for private ot and physio as well.

Then we need optical and ent and cardiac for dd1 and dh and still yet to find out for dd2 and 3.

forgot to mention that for health reasons/special needs you also get a health care card. My nephew has one as he has epilepsy.