cost of treatment

In Australia we have two systems – public (paid for by the government which everyone is entitled to however there is often a long waiting list eg years for some provedures) and private (you get to choose your own doctor, private hospitals often have nicer facilities but not necessarily better care and becasue you are paying you often get in a lot quicker) Under the private system you can either pay in full or most people have private health insurance (level of cover depends on plan you select) but this often involves an excess or co-payment and if the doctors charge over a preset schedule then you can still be out of pocket.

Even though i pay approx $2000 a year for health insurance (family cover with extras for dental, optical etc) I was treated as a public patient in a public hospital (mainly because i live in a country area and the local hospital is public and there are no specioalists here anyway) So i saw no bills at all. I have no idea what the IVIG cost for 5 days but the nurses told me a bed in ICU is $1500 a day and i was there for 42 days! I dont know how much i would have been out of pocket if i had have gone private.

There is a lot of criticism in Australia about our health care system … especially the long waiting lists, but after having GBS i have no complaints at all.