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Dear Doctors and Health Care Workers
We have waited till the last minute to send this bulletin, and we’re glad we did because a revised 1 July MBS file landed in our inbox at 4.50pm today. Ten minutes before the official EOFY! Take a moment to think about that and what it me…
In the 21 June 2022 article for the Medical Republic, Margaret Faux discusses how doctors are vulnerable to misinterpretation of the Medicare billing system, and incorrect advice from the DOH doesn’t help to clarify Medicare’s complex system of laws.
“In the absence of nat…
In the 7 June 2022 article for the Medical Republic, Margaret Faux reflects on the introduction of Medicare’s predecessor, Medibank and the evolvement of that into the Medicare system in place today.
“The ways we pay for health will continue to evolve, but the Australian hea…
Read Margaret Faux’s comments on lifting the ban on testimonials for medical advertising, in the June 7th Sydney Morning Herald article by Dana Daniel, Scrapping ban on patient testimonials would give free rein to cosmetic ‘cowboys’, experts warn.
“I’m really worried a…
In the May 24th, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the five basic rules of good legal drafting in context to some MBS items and the importance of aligning clinical vocabulary when describing clinical services.
“The…
In the May 14th, 2022 issue of The Guardian, Dr Margaret Faux discusses Medicare bulk billing and non-compliant billing within Australian health regulation.
“Working in the underbelly of our health system has taught me that trumpeting artificially hyped statistics is a sign of…
In the May 10th, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the litigation-plagued PSR and the need for reform.
“The PSR has been plagued by litigation since it began, particularly in the area of procedural fairness. My res…
In the April 26th, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the questions of whether a submitted claim will be paid or not, and if paid, whether the doctor was entitled to that payment. The doctors in Margaret’s research c…
In the April 12th, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the Grattan report, bulk billing proposals for Medicare and the structural reforms that are really needed.
“There just is no point in continuing to fiddle with M…
Dr Margaret Faux and Dr Sylvia Pfeiffer are referenced in the article, Winners and Losers in New 10-Year Plan by Holly Payne, published on the Medical Republic website on 6th April, 2022. In this article you can find out more about the significant changes to healthcare in the ref…
Penny Durham author of the article, PSR-strengthening bill sails through committee, published on the Medical Republic website April 4th, informs us of the key changes to the PSR strengthening bill that looks to pass the Senate. The article includes quotes from Dr Margaret Faux o…
A recent article, Misleading VPR reforms will restrict equitable access to health care, published by the Hospital and Health Care website and written by Dr Margaret Faux and Dr Silvia Pfeiffer, discusses the impact of delivery of healthcare services when the Government implemen…
In the March 29th, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the Government’s Medicare ‘fair fee’ definition and discovers it’s neither of those things.
“Medical fee and rebate setting is a complex business, and everyone w…
In the March 15th, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the illegality of bulk-billing and charging a gap and the ignorance around the correct use of Medicare bulk-billing system.
“We know that Medicare billing is pro…
Melissa Davey, Medical Editor of The Guardian, discusses Dr Margaret Faux’s review findings on Medicare. The results are quite shocking.
“We all know we’re paying for health everywhere. But we’re being told we’re not.” Dr Margaret Faux
Read the full article by M…
In the March 1st, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses how MBS descriptions can border on the absurd, making Doctor’s sitting ducks for policing authorities.
“Think on this. If a senior general legal counsel, with d…
In the February 15, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the common misconception that Medicare bulk-billing for public hospital outpatient services leads to double dipping. Margaret discovers however, on close inspectio…
Dear Doctors and Health Care Workers
We have received a handful of good questions over the past few weeks.
Here are the answers.
1. I have some patients where I do home visits in residential care. However, two facilities have COVID cases, and I want to convert to telehea…
Synapse Medical, the company with Australia’s only rules based, enterprise, medical billing system which currently has over 65,000 embedded Medicare billing rules, and IMEXHS, the leading innovator in cloud-based medical imaging solutions, are delighted to announce a partnershi…
In the February 1, 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses the Professional Services Review (PSR) approach to penalising doctors found to have inappropriately billed. When first introduced was described as ‘draconian’ and t…
The Indo-Australian Chamber of Commerce online version of their Annual Report 2020-’21 is now available to view from their website. Synapse is a sponsor for the not-for-profit company, and supports The Chamber’s integral ability to serve the Indo-Australian business commu…
Dear Doctors and Health Care Workers
Before we answer the few questions received in recent days, I thought I would take a moment to say that there has been quite a lot of misinformation spread about the Covid telehealth changes. I saw incorrect information that the 12-month pr…
Dear Doctors and Health Care Workers
The government giveth and the government taketh away and then the government giveth back again!
I’m sure you are all as exhausted as we are trying to keep up with this ever-changing billing landscape, so I’ll keep this short and shar…
In the January 18 2022 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux explains why the latest update to Medicare rebates is no more than a breathtakingly amateur cost-cutting exercise and is completely devoid of any understanding of the law, or …
Dear Doctors and Health Care Workers
Lots of updates with the new laws now in force.
We received some excellent questions, as expected, and with the legislation now on the register we have the following answers and updates.
Before we start, some legal definitions that ar…
Dear Doctors and Health Care Workers
Firstly, we hope you are enjoying the festive season, spending time with loved ones and staying Covid safe.
There are major changes happening to Covid telehealth item numbers from 1 January 2022. The changes have not yet hit the Federal …
So here it is, Merry Christmas!
Welcome to our final update for 2021, which was another difficult year with the world still battling a pandemic.
At Synapse, we continued to make the best of it, by firstly keeping everybody safe (we continued to work from home, and supported our…
In the December 14 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux discusses some entrenched billing myths around referrals.
“Neither GPs nor public hospitals are deliberately rorting anything in this context. Both are just strugglin…
In the November 30 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Dr Margaret Faux and Heather Grain discuss the PSR’s latest expectation – that Doctors adopt the SMART goals in context to management plans for chronic disease.
“The inability of …
In the November 16 issue of The Medical Republic’s Money & Medicine newsletter, Solicitor and CEO of Synapse Medical, Dr Margaret Faux, discusses the poorly understood standard of clinical relevance as Doctors try to navigate a spaghetti junction of standards for Medicare b…