General news

With the arrival of lovely summer days, the medical centre is getting even busier. At the moment we have an average of 6 to 8 weeks wait time for non urgent appointments. We will continue to try manage the bookings and use the triage system to avoid delay for urgent matters. If your appointment is…

In light of the increasing pressure on appointments at FMC and in order to adapt to our staffing fluctuations many of you may have already noticed some changes to the way we manage appointments. We are well aware of the waiting times for non urgent appointments and thank you for your continued patience. In order…

from Dr Phil Worboys It is with a mixture of emotions that I wish to inform the Foster population of my leaving of the Associateship and practice management of the medical centre at the end of June. In addition, I am stopping my anaesthetic work and have been busy these last few months informing my…

Valued patients, please note that Foster and Toora Medical Centre is now using a service called Hotdoc to communicate with you regarding appointments and other services. It sends text messages to confirm appointments. You can confirm with a YES or cancel with a NO (or call us).  Last week we did send an invitation for…

It seems awhile ago that we promised to keep the public up to date with the change in billing policy at Foster and Toora Medical Centres. In fact, it was just before the Federal budget. Which certainly surprised with the headline-grabbing ‘triple bulk billing incentive’ package for GPs. That was a significant announcement… but in…

There have been a couple of walk-in presentations to our nurses unit recently of patients who have had new or ‘significantly different to their normal’ chest pains. Which have turned out to be heart related and potentially life-threatening. We want to remind people to always take such symptoms seriously and to err on the side…

We want to inform people of a (relatively) new service called the Victorian Virtual Emergency Department (or VVED) which we feel may be of help to patients. Go to www.vved.org.au and have a look. The VVED triages and treats patients with non-life-threatening conditions virtually, and is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.…

In the May Budget incentives were increased for bulk billing pensioners, concession card holders and children under 16yo (starting November). This has made it possible for us to continue our current policy which is to bulk bill these groups for standard consultations. Prior to this increase, the rebates offered had fallen to approximately half of…

There have been out of pocket charges for out-patient consultations at South Gippsland Hospital Urgent Care Clinic for many years. These have now been increased to $50 for Pensioners, $90 for Health Card Holders and $140 for Private patients. Payment on the day is expected, otherwise a $20 administration fee will be added.

As of May 1 2023 we will no longer be bulk billing teenagers 16 years or older who have no concession cards (pension, HCC, etc) and a full consultation fee will be charged.  This is the first of a number of changes to our billing that we will be announcing over the coming months.  “Why?”Because…