Data shows women spend more on out-of-pocket expenses

Costs of maternity care are rising faster than other areas of health and there are fears it's contributing to a gender bias within the system.

Transcript

00:00 So the ABC has been reporting on out of pocket costs for health, particularly radiology,

00:06 and following our most recent story, a lot of gynaecologists, obstetricians got in touch

00:10 to say what they've particularly observed for their patients are what they describe

00:15 as a gender bias in the system.

00:17 So their patients are experiencing larger out of pockets for some of their common scans

00:22 than say comparable scans for men.

00:25 And we've heard from a Grattan Institute report that women generally have more out of pocket

00:30 health costs.

00:31 That's not only because of maternity care, but also because they have a higher burden

00:34 of chronic disease.

00:35 So while women are living longer, they're not necessarily living longer well.

00:41 And we also know that the average out of pocket costs for obstetrics has risen from $250

00:46 to $300 for non-hospital services over the past five years, and the bulk billing rates

00:52 are going backwards.

00:54 So we've heard from a lot of people, and cancer treatment comes up a lot, so in particular

00:58 breast cancer treatment.

01:00 A lot of women say based on their experiences, they're feeling that they're getting a lot

01:04 more out of pocket costs than say men with various cancers.

01:08 And in particular, there's a bit of a hole when it comes to mammograms, because the screening

01:13 is free, but if you need diagnostic imaging that follows that up, they then are slugged

01:17 with hundreds of dollars in out of pocket costs.

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