I received an email from the US Consulate in Sydney with further instructions regarding the K1 visa that TA and I had applied for. Some of the things, such as police clearances, I had applied for earlier, but one requirement that I had yet to do was the US visa medical.

In Western Australia, there are only two physicians authorized by the US Consulate to conduct these medicals. I made an appointment at the Mill Street Medical Centre with Doctor Sinclair for mine. The clinic told me that I would need a total of 6 US passport photos. I had four taken during my recent trip to the USA, which meant I needed more. I went to Australia Post to have these done. In addition, prior to my visa medical I went to my local physician, who gave me the Tdap-IPV vaccination for tetanus/diptheria/pertussis/polio.

Cost of passport photos: A$16.95 for four (US$12.88 at US$0.76 to A$1), which makes them less than half the cost of the photos I had taken at Kinkos in the USA.

Cost of Tdap-IPV vaccine: A$79 (US$60.04)

The visa medical with Dr Sinclair took the better part of a day, as after the basic medical I had to go to the radiology clinic to have a chest X-ray taken and then return the documentation from the chest x-ray back to Dr Sinclair to complete the visa medical form. It was the first time I had ever had a chest x-ray done, so I found that to be pretty exciting.

Total for visa medical: A$566.60, made up of A$350 for the examination, A$80 for the chest x-ray, A$25 for the US visa syphilis pathology and A$60 for MMR IgG to check if I was immune to measles/mumps/rubella. I had vaccination records for everything else from my local doctor, so that cut down on the tests needed.

The next day on my way to work, I received a call from the clinic as my MMR serology results were back: I was not immune to mumps! I had to go back to the clinic to receive the MMR vaccine so that Dr Sinclair could complete my medical report. I went in that morning and was able to pick up my report in the afternoon!

Cost of MMR vaccine: A$45

Total costs associated with visa medical: A$707.45 or US$537.66