A federal review has found Medicare's fee structure disadvantages women patients and women general practitioners, because both are more likely to use and to provide longer consultations. Women in Victoria's Southern Metropolitan Region told a state inquiry the same thing two years ago. Women's Health in the South East wants the final report to recommend that the rebate per minute no longer falls as the consultation gets longer.
"Women told us their appointments were too short and their general practitioner always seemed rushed and overbooked. We wrote that down and sent it to an inquiry. What we could not tell them was why," said WHISE Chief Executive Officer Kit McMahon.
"Now we can. Medicare pays less per minute the longer a consultation runs, and the appointment a woman needs is almost always the long one."
The Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS) Review Advisory Committee released its Time-Tiered Working Group draft report on 3 September 2026. In 2023 to 2024, women general practitioners provided 40.3 per cent of all non-referred general practice attendances and 52.6 per cent of the level D consultations that run 40 to 59 minutes. Those are among the consultations Medicare pays least per minute for.
Women's Health in the South East (WHISE) is the regional women's health service for Victoria's Southern Metropolitan Region, working across ten local government areas and 1.56 million people.
The region put this in writing two years ago
In 2024, WHISE gathered the lived experience of more than 120 women and gender diverse people for the Victorian Inquiry into Women's Pain, with Afri-Aus Care and Wellsprings for Women.
The Wellsprings submission recorded that when women do see a general practitioner, "the consultation times are too short and do not allow them to properly explore their health concerns. Many commented that the GP always seems rushed and overbooked."
At WHISE forums in April 2026, participants named inadequate Medicare rebates among the costs of a growing two-tiered health system. Their strongest theme was not being believed, and being believed takes time.
Ms McMahon said the remedy is a pricing decision.
"Recommendation 5 should say plainly what it implies. Recommend that the rebate per minute no longer falls as the consultation gets longer. Without that principle the tiers just get renamed, and the woman who needs forty minutes still gets nineteen."
The finding belongs in two places
WHISE supports Recommendations 5 and 6 and will say so in a submission before the consultation closes on 15 October 2026 and will put the same finding to the Senate's Select Committee on Women's Health.
"Women in this region described this problem before anyone had costed it, and the review has confirmed they were right. What is left is a pricing decision, and it is still open."
