What postpartum care is currently funded by Medicare in Australia?

Medicare currently funds standard GP consultations for postpartum care, but there is no dedicated postpartum care plan or care coordination item equivalent to a Chronic Disease Management plan. The six-week postnatal check with a GP is standard practice but not always systematic, and there is no mandated follow-up for mental health screening, breastfeeding support, or wound assessment beyond the immediate postnatal period. Access to mental health care via a Mental Health Care Plan (Better Access) is available for postpartum anxiety and depression, but referral rates remain below need.

What is the RACGP asking for in the Senate inquiry?

The RACGP has called for a dedicated, Medicare-funded GP-led postpartum care plan — similar in structure to existing care plans for chronic conditions — and the establishment of a National Breastfeeding Advisory Council. It has also called for state and territory governments to digitise the Pregnancy Health Record and Baby Book, enabling continuity across providers and settings. The college has emphasised GPs as the central continuity contact for postpartum families, particularly in the absence of structured specialist follow-up.

Postpartum care Senate inquiry: the 'cliff edge' is now on the record

What just happened

The RACGP reported today that Australia’s newly formed Senate Select Committee on Women’s Health will examine postpartum care as one of its first areas of investigation — and the terms of reference name, explicitly, the things that usually get talked around.

The inquiry will look at best-practice approaches to postpartum healthcare for mothers and partners, the physical, psychological, emotional and economic impacts of birth, antenatal and postpartum reproductive health support, and — this is the one worth noting — women’s experiences seeking healthcare for pain, including the role of medical misogyny.

That last phrase is doing real work. Formal Senate inquiries do not typically use the term. Its presence in the terms of reference signals that this committee has chosen to name the structural problem, not just its symptoms.

Dr Cathryn Hester, quoted in the newsGP report, put it clearly: access to postpartum care “can be contingent on cost, on location and also on health literacy.” Dr Kavita Thanakrishnan added that too many women experience a cliff edge in support the moment they return home from hospital. These are not new observations — but their arrival in a formal Senate inquiry gives them institutional weight that may actually move funding decisions.

Both-and

What the cliff edge looks like

The postpartum period is one of the most biologically and psychologically demanding of a woman’s life, and the formal system largely steps back from it once the birth admission ends. A standard six-week postnatal check with a GP is common practice but not uniformly structured, not systematically linked to mental health screening, and not always accessible to women who are geographically isolated, on low incomes, or caring for an infant without support.

Perinatal mental health disorders — anxiety, depression, birth trauma responses — are among the most common complications of the postpartum period, affecting an estimated one in five women to some degree. The current Medicare infrastructure for addressing them is present in principle (Better Access Mental Health Care Plans are accessible to anyone) but underutilised in practice: identifying and referring a postpartum woman in distress requires a GP contact that does not happen if she has not come in.

The economics compound the geography. Postnatal home visits by midwives, access to a lactation consultant, private physiotherapy for pelvic floor recovery — none of these are currently Medicare-funded, or are funded only partially and inconsistently. For a woman who is not in a position to pay out-of-pocket for these services, the postpartum system offers considerably less than it does for someone in a higher socioeconomic bracket.

What the RACGP is asking for

The college has used the inquiry as an opportunity to advance a specific ask: a dedicated Medicare-funded GP-led postpartum care plan — structured, systematic, and with a coordination role that ensures the GP is an active part of the postnatal system rather than a service women may or may not happen to access.

The model is not entirely new — it mirrors the structure of Chronic Disease Management plans, which provide rebates for a GP-coordinated approach to complex ongoing care. The logic is similar: postpartum care, particularly for women with perinatal mental health issues, pelvic floor disorders, or complex births, benefits from a structured GP-led plan rather than a series of disconnected one-off consultations.

The RACGP has also called for digitisation of the Pregnancy Health Record and Baby Book. These documents — currently mostly paper in most states and territories — travel with the woman but do not communicate across systems. A digital record accessible to the GP, the maternal and child health nurse, and any involved specialists would enable the continuity that current systems cannot provide.

What an inquiry can and cannot do

A Senate inquiry is not a policy announcement. It is a mechanism for evidence-gathering that produces recommendations, to which the government of the day then responds on its own timeline. Inquiry recommendations on women’s health have historically had a mixed track record when it comes to translation into funded programs.

What this inquiry can do is create a formal record of the gap — the kind of documented, expert-cited record that budget proposals can be built around. The naming of medical misogyny in the terms of reference is one signal that the committee is not approaching this as a routine health systems review.

What it cannot do is change the reimbursement structure before it reports, or guarantee that recommendations will be acted on. The cliff edge will remain for the women who give birth between now and whenever the system changes — and those women will, as they always have, navigate it primarily through a general practice relationship, or not at all.

My two cents

This is the kind of inquiry where the terms of reference are almost as important as the eventual report. The committee has named medical misogyny as a legitimate subject for investigation in the context of postpartum care — which is not a small thing when we consider that postpartum depression, birth trauma, and pelvic floor dysfunction are still routinely underfunded, underdiagnosed, and undertreated.

For women in the postpartum period who are not receiving the care they need: the six-week check is a starting point, not a ceiling. A conversation with your GP about what is and is not being addressed — mental health, physical recovery, breastfeeding support — is something you do not need to wait for a formal care plan to have.

For GPs: the inquiry is also asking about your capacity to provide this care within the current system. The evidence you contribute to the feedback process matters.

Verdict: yes — this inquiry names the right problem and the RACGP submission sets a clear, achievable benchmark for what reform should look like.

Sources cited

Parliament to investigate postpartum health. RACGP newsGP, 20 August 2026. https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/professional/parliament-to-investigate-postpartum-health