Hello, my name is Simon. I am a 59-year-old man who lives alone in downtown Perth. I am pleased to say that I have never had to spend a night in a hospital. This is because I know how to take care of myself. When I was growing up my grandpa often used to tell me that if you eat well and exercise, you will live a long life. He died aged 95, so he must have known something. However, it was only when I became friends with a doctor, that I discovered all the other things I could do to stay healthy. I decided to start this blog to encourage others to look after their health.
There have been many discussions on Medicare and more specifically the benefits of bulk billing. The issues arising include complaints that bulk billing is not as profitable as patients covering their own consultation and administration fees; however, bulk billing seems to serve another less known purpose. It has significant benefits to pathology.
Pathology has to do with studying diseases — their nature, development, causes and effects. In other words, pathology deals with knowing what makes you sneeze or cough or fall ill in general. This knowledge is used to improve detection, treatment and even prevention of diseases. In other words, knowing why you are sick helps you not get sick in future. Bulk billing relates to this in a number of ways as shown below.
Prevention
Pathology relies on tests done whenever one goes to see a doctor. These tests reveal if a person is at risk of developing a serious health problem. Without bulk billing, people will avoid such tests and therefore become prone to illnesses that could have been presented early such as stroke or heart attack from high cholesterol.
Early Detection
Pathology helps doctors to get information key to early identification of your disease. And this can be the difference between surviving a chronic illness or not. Diseases like breast cancer and cervical cancer can be treated if detected early. A bulk billing medical centre is therefore better suited to handle any issues on women's healthcare. You would want to find out early if you had an illness that could significantly change your life.
Management of Health Conditions
People with chronic health conditions such as diabetes need continuous testing to help keep it under control. That way, people can continue with their normal lives. This is because any change in their systems (weight, blood sugar levels, temperature, blood pressure) is noted early and the nature and dosage of drugs is altered to counter the disease. If this were not the case, patients would only be aware that they are deteriorating when seriously ill.
Staying Healthy
The tests accessible through bulk billing help in data collection and ultimately this data informs government policies on such matters as immunization. Visiting a bulk billing health centre therefore does more good than can be seen on the surface. Without this knowledge and information, it would take emergencies for people to visit a doctor by which time it would be too late. Without bulk billing, these tests would cost more and be inaccessible to some people altogether.
Share20 May 2016
