Medicare related payments to Australian medical practitioners

This article analyses Medicare payments to doctors, both general practitioners and specialists. Although these payments represented approximately $4.5 billion in 1991-92, there has been little public analysis of the breakdown of these payments to different medical specialties and general practitioners. These payments are just one source of income for many doctors. Information on practice costs is also presented to give an indication of the size of doctors' net incomes. A comparison is also made between doctors' incomes and taxpayers in general.