Read This:

It's Important

by Katherine Cummings

(The Gender Centre advise that this article may not be current and as such certain content, including but not limited to persons, contact details and dates may not apply. Where legal authority or medical related matters are cited, responsibility lies with the reader to obtain the most current relevant legal authority and/or medical publication.)

Medicare provides rebates on medical procedures using schedules which provide item numbers for all medical procedures. Most of these are presumably gender neutral ... a broken leg is a broken leg, whether it is part of a woman or a man. But some item numbers are gender related and a man cannot claim on an item number reserved for women and vice versa.

Of course this disadvantages transgendered people because a person defined as a man when he starts affirmation surgery cannot claim for a neo-vagina because that is reserved for the women's schedule. Similarly a person defined by Medicare as a woman cannot claim on male related items. This usually means that transgenders have been able in the past to claim only for the first part of their affirmation surgery, the part that removes the parts of their anatomy related to their assigned gender, leaving them to pay for all the procedures which relate to creating new parts appropriate to their innate gender.

A recent enquiry to Medicare has given new hope for those who would like to claim more fully on their surgical procedures of gender affirmation. We were told, by the Medicare authorities that transgenders should claim for the first batch of procedures and then have their birth certificates amended by the Registry at Births, Deaths and Marriages, after which they can claim on the second batch of procedures, on the basis of their newly recognised sex. It should also be noted that if you have private health insurance, this cuts out when Medicare cuts out. In other words, if you are denied a rebate on a procedure because your Medicare records show you as belonging to the 'wrong' sex, then your private health cover will cut out at the same point. But if you have your birth certificate amended and claim the remainder of your rebate through the Medicare Tribunal, you should also be able to claim the rest of your private health insurance component.

This development applies mainly to those who are about to have surgery in Australia, but if you have recently had surgery and have had your birth certificate amended, you may still be able to go to the Medicare Tribunal and make your claim.

If any of you do approach the Tribunal for this purpose, please let us know the outcome. It almost seems to be too good to be true!

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