There is nothing wrong with trying to save yourself money,and find equivalent service elsewhere that is covered. I went through the same thing recently with my CT coronary angiogram. It is not covered by medicare,and my healthfund does not cover it either. My GP referal was to a very elite private hospital that does the procedure. They wanted almost $1000 to do it. That's totally payable by me, no help from insurance or medicare. Who has an extra $1000 laying around for an CT?

I started calling around other imaging places and I got another place offering to do it for $570. So then i thought if I continue placing calls, I may get it for even less. Finally the imaging centre I found said we do your lungs and bill medicare,and since we do your lungs we will do the Coronary angiogram for free.

I got the procedure done for free. When I told my GP, I sensed that he had a bit of an attitude with me not using the centre that charges $1000.

Go figure-