I am itemizing my tax return. Which medical expenses can I deduct?
When itemizing your medical expenses, the medical expenses you can deduct include:
For the treatment of a disease:
- Diagnosis
- Curing
- Easing
- Treatment
- Prevention
If one of those applies, you can also include the associated costs for:
- Equipment
- Supplies
- Diagnostic services
The expenses must be primarily to improve or prevent a physical or mental deficiency or illness.
Deductible medical expenses include:
- Acupuncture
- Alcoholism treatment
- Ambulance service
- Annual physicals
- Bandages
- Birth control
- Body scan
- Braces
- Braille books and magazines for the visually impaired
- Breast pumps and supplies
- Chiropractic care
- Christian Science practitioner care
- Contact lenses and the supplies required to maintain them
- Necessary dental treatment (doesn’t include whitening)
- Diagnostic devices (Ex: blood sugar test kit for a diabetic)
- Drug addiction treatment
- Prescribed medications
- Eye doctor
- Eye glasses
- Eye surgery
- Fertility enhancement
- Guide dog or other service animal
- Hearing aids
- Home care
- Insulin
- Insurance premiums
- Lab fees
- Lead-based paint removal (not repainting)
- Certain Medicare A, B, and, D
- Nursing home or services
- Oxygen
- Physical or occupational therapy
- Prosthesis
- Psychiatric care
- Psychologist
- Sex-reassignment surgery and related hormone therapy for the treatment of gender-identity disorder disease
- Sterilization
- Smoking cessation programs except over-the-counter nicotine gums and patches
- Surgery
- Transplants
- Transportation to obtain medical care
- X-rays
Related Resources
If you’re itemizing deductions, the IRS generally allows you a medical expenses deduction if you have unreimbursed expenses that are more than 7.5% of your adjusted gross income for tax years 2017 or 2018. You can deduct the cost of care from several types of practitioners at various stages of care.
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