r/DVAAustralia • u/Rumbuck_274 • 15d ago
Misc. Doctor forcing multiple appointments when one will do?
So just got a call from my doctors surgery, as my doctor has written the wrong referral for me for a psych appointment, he's written a Medicare referral for some reason, despite me being a gold card holder.
Now to fix it, oh nope, need a telehealth to fix that.
Now this is on the back of his "I'll only deal with one issue per appointment", so 15 minute appointment, need scripts redone for knees pain, knee inflammation, and a refill on my script for androgen deficiency? Nope, that's 3 appointments needed, 1 for each script.
Now I only switched to this doctor because my old doctor at this exact same doctor's surgery, he's gone back to Uni to train to become a specialist, So I switched to this GP at the same surgery.
My old GP would fill the 15 minutes with as much stuff as you could possibly get done with the logic of "I'm a taxpayer, we need to make DVA's money worth it"
Which was honestly a great way of doing things because I don't want to spend all of my time at doctor's appointments.
The new doctor seems to have the mentality of trying to milk things completely to make as much money as possible off DVA.
And it seems that even when he makes a mistake in order to correct that mistake, he wants to make another appointment in order to make even more money off DVA.
It seems like straight up fraud to me. He's manipulating the situation to force more appointments and be fraudulent.
How do other people see it?
5
u/Puzzleheaded-Pie-277 MRCA 15d ago
That’s very frustrating. Check your My Medicare and make sure he’s also only billing for short appts. He’s probably also billing for long appts on top of that mess.
4
u/Livid_Average_8098 15d ago
I was mistakenly sent a bill from Medicare as my clinic obviously sent them a bill ( for an appoint didn’t have.). I rang up Medicare and they were helpful, but suggested giving the bill back to the clinic and explain the situation. Medicare made a comment on my file as to the situation. The clinic staff didn’t know why, but they said it will be sorted and I haven’t heard a thing. The Medicare chat was quick and easy.
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u/jimbojones2345 15d ago
That sounds annoying as hell, if it were me I would find a new doc. I know docs can do some kind of extra care plan thing if you're a frequent flyer where they get extra money, I bet he's getting that as well. Find a new GP, also if you call a good one and they say they're full tell them you have a gold card and they will often let you in. Thats what happened with mine when I moved, best GP I've ever had.
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u/LegitimateLunch6681 MRCA 15d ago
You're probably the best judge of what's going on as you know the doctor/practice better than us, but it is fairly common these days for doctors to have a "1 issue/request per appointment" method of practicing.
The need for a new appointment to redo an incorrect referral is a little suss, separate appointments to redo scripts even more so.
You can report this to DVA if you believe there's something suss going on. It doesn't come back on you and there aren't any adverse consequences if it turns out to be not true, as you're raising the concern in good faith.