What is private health insurance?
Just like comprehensive car insurance, private health insurance covers you for the unexpected. Unlike car insurance, there are dozens of day-to-day health treatments you can claim back. It’s not all about the big stuff: what about gym membership, or a massage?
Private health insurance is a great way to cover the costs of the treatments to improve your health and wellbeing.
What about Medicare?
Medicare is the public healthcare system, funded by a levy. Australian citizens - and most permanent residents - are eligible for Medicare.
Whilst Medicare will pay towards many things - such as a visit to the doctor, an eye test, or being a public patient in a public hospital - there are many things it won’t cover.
These include the cost of an ambulance, glasses and contact lenses, most dental treatments, physiotherapy, non-PBS prescriptions, and other day-to-day health services. It can also leave you with a gap - the difference between the cost of a doctor’s appointment, for example, and what the doctor actually charges.
Private health insurance gives you the freedom to choose the treatment you want, when and where you want it - and have much, if not all, of the costs covered.
Private health insurance comes in three types of cover: Hospital, Extras and Ambulance.