Has anyone had a bub with La Trobe Health

[pippy85]

Hello

My husband and I are trying for a baby but we don't have the full HI cover for pregnancy yet.

But, I found a link to La Trobe Health which has a 9 month pregnancy wait period, however I am skeptical because it sounds too good to be true.

Has anyone out there had a good experience using La Trobe? How bad was the OOP expenses and would you recommend them as a health provider?

Also, we have recently moved to Melbourne and I'm curious about the Royal Womens birth experience, being that it is a fairly new hospital?

Private Vs Public? We live in the South-Eastern suburbs of Melbourne and the nearest public hospitals are across town, whereas all the private ones seem very close.

Any help and advice would be greatly appreciated!!

Cheers
Pip

[sosie]

We had our son last year with latrobe. I was lucky as i conceived a week after cover commenced which meant i just made it.

I had a c section 3 weeks earlier and technicaly I had not served the 9 months, but because my due date would have been past the 9 month they covered it without a drama.

secondly, obviously all the hopital stay of 6 days was covered.

the only oop i had was that of which the ob charged me, 1800 for the birth where as if i had have been with another larger fund he would have particpated in the gap scheme and i would not have had to pay this amount at all. of this i recieved 800 from the fund and medicare combined, so technically my true oop was 1000.00.

the anaesthetist billed direct to the fund and there was no oop.

to me it suited our needs at the time and if i had not have taken cover with them when i did i would not have been covered by anyone else.

there were little things here and there such as pathology but i was only oop about 50.

that being said i have now swapped to medibank private and due with the third, the same ob will not be charging me the 1800 at all this time.

we have used medibank for quite a few things this year and what i like is the fact there is no excess for my children. my daughter is due to have grommets and it will not cost a cent.

my partner just had a colonoscopy and a bowel repair and all we paid was the excess and there was no other charge.

when comparing latrobe and medibank, policy price for latrobe was 130 roughly versus 180 p/m with medibank, when i figured out the total cost of latrobe over 9 months for a delivery versus having to pay medibank for 12 months for a delivery, i would have paid 990 more with medibank for coverage for a birth and although the birth fee would not be charged i would have paid 990 extra to be with medibank for the policy and only therefore saved 10 if that makes sense. so they actually worked out the same. however when you compare both over 12 months (as you are not planning to have a baby right now) the figures would be different and so on and so on. For a long term policy with a family i would go with someone else, if you want the peace of mind of having access to the private system at a cheaper price per month and dont mind having some bills afterwards then choose latrobe.

an example of our situation over the last year and a half: we have had my son circumcised under general anaesthetic due to a foreskin that was stuck (no charge what so ever, no excess) if we were with latrobe the receptionist in the paediatricians room said we would have had to pay about 500. my daughters grommets would cost, my partners recent procedure would have cost and again this pending birth would cost.

luckily we swapped as we seemed to all pack it in this year and im glad we are with medibank haha.

Hoever at the time I was just so so so grateful to have found latrobe when i did and I sort of felt guilty leaving them as I know what I had paid in premiums for all of 9 months would not have even come close to what they would have had to pay for my stay at the hospital I stayed at (it was like a hotel).

hope this gives you some insight :)