More than half of the 47 reforms promised under the Strengthening Medicare banner have been implemented, but only one has been fully evaluated.
The Department of Health, Disability and Ageing has released the first of what will be a yearly progress report on the Strengthening Medicare measures, revealing a steady rollout and positive signs within the primary care sector.
With just one of the 47 total reform measures fully evaluated, though, it may be some time before a clear picture emerges of how the investments have changed Medicare and primary healthcare.
According to the report, which covered investments and activity from 2023 to June 2025, 57% of the government’s pledges made under the Strengthening Medicare banner have now completed delivery.
These include initiatives like tripled bulk billing incentive payments for children and concession card holders, the establishment of a Level E MBS item and the national scope of practice review.
A further 38% were in the process of being implemented and delivered, including the MyMedicare voluntary patient registration system and the nationwide network of Medicare Urgent Care Clinics.
To this end, as of June 2025, there were 6654 practices registered on MyMedicare, along with more than three million patients.
There are still very few perks for GPs or patients available under MyMedicare.
One of these is the triple bulk billing incentive for MyMedicare-registered patients aged under 16 years and concession card holders accessing long telehealth services. According to the progress report, that cohort of patients accessed 200,000 of these bulk billed telehealth services between November 2023 and June 2025.
The second big MyMedicare-linked incentive, the GP Aged Care Incentive, went live in July 2024.
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As the DoHDA tells it, the uptake of this incentive was a MyMedicare success story.
“The success of the MyMedicare system was demonstrated through the uptake of the General Practice in Aged Care Incentive (GPACI),” the report read.
“GPACI registrations went live on 1 July 2024. GPACI has led to increased services in aged care homes.”
As of June 2025, there were 1744 GPACI registered practices with active patients.
The third promised MyMedicare incentive, the wraparound primary care for frequent hospital users program, is one of the two remaining Strengthening Medicare initiatives not to have progressed past the planning phase.
The other is funding for the development of innovative primary care delivery models for thin markets.
Despite 45 of the 47 original Strengthening Medicare measures now being either complete or in the process of being rolled out, only one has been completely evaluated.
Just under half have no evaluation activities planned or undertaken; some initiatives, like the scope of practice review, for example, are likely unsuitable for an evaluation.
Of the initiatives where evaluation activities will go ahead, there are nine with an evaluation planned and another 17 with an evaluation being undertaken.
The sole completed evaluation was for the General Practice Grant Program, where GP practices and Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations were given one-off grants for training, equipment or minor capital works.
An evaluation of the urgent care clinic network is currently in progress, but the evaluation of the implementation of MyMedicare is still in the planning phase.
The DoHDA plans to release another progress report next year covering June 2025 to June 2026.
