Medical expenses: what you can claim

Dental work, prescription glasses and drugs, private health plan premiums: many health costs can lower your tax. The federal medical expense tax credit covers a long list of expenses for you and your family, but only the part above a yearly threshold, so it pays to know what counts and to keep every receipt.

How the credit works

The medical expense tax credit is non-refundable. It lowers the federal tax you owe, but it can’t create a refund on its own. You add up your eligible expenses and subtract a threshold: for 2025, the lesser of 3% of your net income and $2,834. What’s left is the amount you claim.

Like most federal non-refundable credits, that amount is multiplied by the lowest federal tax rate, 14.5% for 2025. Outside Quebec, you also claim a provincial or territorial medical expense credit on your Form 428, and its amounts can differ from the federal ones; see the personal tax credits table.

You can claim only the part of an expense that nobody has reimbursed or will reimburse, such as through private insurance, unless the reimbursement is included in someone’s income (a taxable benefit on a T4, for example) and wasn’t deducted elsewhere on the return. Amounts paid outside Canada generally count too.

Whose expenses you can claim

You can claim what you or your spouse or common-law partner paid for:

• yourself
• your spouse or common-law partner
• your or your partner’s children who were under 18 at the end of the year.

These share one threshold. You can also claim what either of you paid for other relatives who depended on you for support: your or your partner’s children who were 18 or older at year-end, grandchildren, and parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews who were residents of Canada at some time in the year. Each of them is worked out separately, with a threshold based on their own net income.

Which partner should make the claim is covered in pooling donations and medical expenses.

Choose your 12 months

You don’t have to use the calendar year. You can claim expenses paid in any 12-month period that ends in the tax year, as long as they weren’t claimed for the year before. For a person who died, the period can be any 24 months that include the date of death.

Common expenses that count

The CRA’s list is long. Expenses you can usually claim include:

• services of doctors, dentists, nurses and hospitals, including dentures, dental implants and orthodontic work
• prescription drugs and medications recorded by a pharmacist
• eyeglasses and contact lenses (with a prescription), and laser eye surgery
• hearing aids, wheelchairs, crutches, walkers and artificial limbs
• premiums you pay to a private health services plan
• ambulance service, in vitro fertility programs and medical services outside Canada.

Some items need a prescription from a medical practitioner, and others need the practitioner’s written certification or an approved disability tax credit certificate (Form T2201). The CRA’s list of common medical expenses shows which. Attendant care and care in a nursing home or other facility have detailed rules of their own, set out in Guide RC4065; see also caregiver credits.

Common expenses that don’t count

• gym and fitness club fees
• over-the-counter medications, vitamins and supplements, even if a practitioner prescribed them (the exception is vitamin B12 therapy for pernicious anaemia, which needs a prescription)
• purely cosmetic procedures, such as teeth whitening, hair replacement or wrinkle fillers; surgery needed for medical or reconstructive reasons can qualify
• blood pressure monitors and organic food
• premiums for provincial or territorial health care plans
• health plan premiums your employer paid that weren’t included in your income.

Travel to get care

If substantially equivalent care wasn’t available near your home, you took a reasonably direct route, and it was reasonable to go where you did, you may be able to claim travel costs:

• At least 40 km one way: public transportation such as a bus, train or taxi, or vehicle expenses if public transportation wasn’t readily available.
• At least 80 km one way: accommodation, meals and parking as well. This can include travel outside Canada.
• Less than 40 km, or a trip only to pick up a device or medication: no travel claim.

If a medical practitioner certifies in writing that the patient couldn’t travel alone, an attendant’s travel costs count too. Meals and vehicle costs can be worked out with the CRA’s simplified method or the detailed method, which needs all receipts for the period. Keep accommodation receipts either way.

Keep your receipts

Don’t send receipts with your return, but keep them in case the CRA asks. A receipt should show who was paid, what for, the date, the patient’s name and, if it applies, the practitioner who prescribed the item or gave the service. Receipts for attendant care or therapy paid to an individual should show their social insurance number. The CRA may also ask for proof of payment and, for a dependant 18 or older, proof that you supported them.

Two related claims

• Disability supports deduction: if you have an impairment in physical or mental functions, you may be able to claim some expenses as this deduction instead, or split them between the two claims, whichever is better for you, as long as the total isn’t more than you paid.
• Refundable medical expense supplement: a refundable credit for working people with low incomes and high medical expenses. You may qualify if you claim medical expenses or the disability supports deduction, were resident in Canada all year, were 18 or older at year-end, had at least a minimum amount of employment or self-employment earnings, and had adjusted family net income under a limit. The CRA’s page on the supplement gives both amounts for the year, and the Federal Worksheet works out what you get.

If you live in Quebec

Your Quebec return has its own medical expense credit (Schedule B):

• For 2025, you claim expenses above 3% of your family income: your income plus your spouse’s, if you had a spouse on December 31.
• For 2025, the credit is 20% of the amount you claim.
• The expenses can be for you, your spouse or a dependant (Revenu Québec has its own definition), paid in any 12 consecutive months ending in the year.
• The premium for the Québec prescription drug insurance plan can count, depending on the 12-month period you choose.

Quebec also has a refundable tax credit for medical expenses for workers with lower family incomes, and a separate credit for travel and lodging to get medical services in Québec that aren’t available within 200 km of home.

What to do

1. Gather receipts for your family and any relatives you support, leaving out anything insurance paid back.
2. Choose the 12-month period ending in the tax year that captures the most expenses.
3. Decide which partner claims, and check the refundable supplement if you work and have a low income.
4. Keep every receipt. To see what a credit is worth to you, try our income tax calculator.