Health insurance
The Austrian health insurance guarantees its insurance holders at least partly assumptions of costs for medical treatments.
There are two types of health insurances: Compulsory insurance and private health insurance.
Compulsory insurance
The compulsory insurance applies to employees with a specific income limit and to self-employed people and entrepreneurs.
The following groups of people are also insured: recipients of unemployment benefits, pensioners and family members (on particular conditions).
The co-insured family members are:
- Spouses, partners in a registered partnership and partners in a long-term relationship on special conditions
- Children until the age of 18
- Non-employed children until the age of 21
- Children, undergoing further education or training, until the age of 26
There is a limited extent of insurance cover in the compulsory insurance. This means, that some services (f.ex. dental prosthesis) need to be paid completely or at least partly by the patients themselves.
In case of a hospital stay, patients need to give a financial contribution for each day of stay.
Private health insurance
It is possible to optionally cover an additional private health insurance. This private health insurance can extend the limited extent of insurance cover of the compulsory insurance.
Expenses
Many doctors have contracts with particular public health insurance companies. This means, that the costs of treatment are directly billed from the doctors to the insurance company. In most cases, patients do not have any further expenses. However, there are exceptions, for example for civil servants.
Patients need a so-called E-card for their doctor’s visit. This cheque-card-sized card is issued by your social security company and replaces the former health insurance certificate. The E-card is mandatory for your expenses of medical treatment.
Patients need to directly pay their expenses at doctors, who do not have any contracts with a particular public health insurance company. A partial refund of the costs is possible after submitting the bills at your public health insurance company. These doctors are called Wahlarzt (i.e. doctor of your choice, non-accredited by the Social Security)
A private health insurance can at least partly cover some costs of medical treatment.
You need to pay a prescription charge (2015: € 5,55) for prescription drugs.
Source: BMASK/BM.I