Fees and charges for admitted patients

An admitted patient is defined as:

a person who undergoes a hospital's admission process to receive treatment and care
a patient whose entire care is not provided within a designated emergency department or urgent care centre and who meets at least one of the criteria for admission.

Admission can occur in a traditional hospital setting, in other settings under specified programs, or in the patient’s home (for example, patients in the Hospital in the Home program).

Patients who are admitted to a public hospital are classified as one of the following:

public admitted
private admitted
compensable (Transport Accident Commission, WorkSafe, Department of Veterans' Affairs, or other)
nursing-home type
ineligible.

Patient election

Election criteria and process for admitted public, private, compensable, Veterans’ Affairs and ineligible patients.

Private patients

Private patients in Victoria are responsible for payment of certain hospitals fees and charges.

Compensable patients

Admitted patients accessing health services through the DVA, TAC, Worksafe or other arrangement can be compensated for certain fees and charges.

Reciprocal healthcare agreements

Reciprocal healthcare agreements allow people from certain countries who are visiting or working in Australia to receive medical benefits under certain circumstances.

Ineligible patients

Medicare-ineligible patients (patients who are not covered by Medicare, including overseas patients) are charged fees at the discretion of individual health services

Nursing home type patients

A patient becomes a Nursing Home Type patient following 35 days of continuous hospitalisation

Reviewed 22 February 2016

Health.vic

Contact details

Street address: 50 Lonsdale Street, Melbourne, Victoria, 3000

Department of Health and Human Services GPO Box 4057, Melbourne, VIC 3000

Mailing address: GPO Box 4057, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Melbourne, VIC

Phone 1300 650 172

healthagenciesreporting@dhhs.vic.gov.au