A second telehealth-related perk has been added to the government’s patient registration scheme.
From November this year, patients who are registered with MyMedicare will be eligible for telehealth rebates even if they haven’t seen their GP in person in over 12 months.
Since 2021, Medicare has had a rule in place that patients could only claim telehealth rebates for GP visits if they had seen that clinician face-to-face at least once in the previous 12 months.
The rule was specific to general practice, although news also came this week that telehealth appointments with nurse practitioners would be similarly restricted.
AMA president Dr Danielle McMullen said she was informed of the incoming changes to GP telehealth rules at the same time as the new nursing rules, which the AMA had been lobbying for.
“We know it’s been frustrating for GPs, having to constantly check when [patients] were last here, even for patients that they know very well and who have been attending the practice for years and years,” Dr McMullen told The Medical Republic.
“That 12 months sometimes rolls around quite quickly, and so we did push government to think about better solutions to balance continuity of care with clinical judgment.
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“Now that we have MyMedicare as a system of enrolment, if your patient is enrolled with MyMedicare with your practice, then that will count as the continuity of care required.”
RACGP president Dr Michael Wright told TMR that it would hopefully encourage patients to sign up to MyMedicare.
“It’s a good sign in that it is providing some incentive to support continuity by saying, ‘if you’ve got your regular GP, you can continue to access their services’,” he said.
“And so you are giving some stronger reasons for patients to register.”
Since its introduction in 2023, there have been limited patient-facing incentives to sign up with MyMedicare.
The only active patient-facing incentives are access to rebates for Level C, D and E telehealth consults and access to the tripled bulk billing incentives that can be applied to them.
For GPs and practices, the only active incentive is the new General Practice in Aged Care incentive.
A new incentive for chronic condition management items is set to join the scheme in July this year.