Most taxpayers claim the standard deduction.
Those who opt to itemize do so because they have enough tax deductible expenses to exceed their filing status' standard amount. In most cases, those expenses are medical.
Generally, you can claim allowable medical costs for yourself, your spouse, and dependents as long as the treatments were prescribed by a physician as necessary to diagnose, ease, or prevent a physical or mental illness.
The amount of these medical costs that exceed 7.5 percent of your adjusted gross income count on your Schedule A, the form where you detail your itemized deductions.
The list of medical costs you can claim includes the usual ones. These are what you pay out-of-pocket to medical professionals, as well as your copays for prescription drugs. But the Internal Revenue Service approved medical expenses list is much longer than these basics.
I cover many of these common and more unusual tax deductible medical costs in my post 11 medical costs that could make itemizing the best tax Rx, as well as look at health cost deductions in my post Maximizing your itemized tax deductions.
Tax help covering IVF costs: But given a recent medical, judicial, legislative (state and federal), and social topic in the news, I wanted to point out that in vitro fertilization (IVF) costs are tax deductible medical expenses.
This specialized fertility treatment is specifically noted in IRS Publication 502, Medical and Dental Expenses. The section on page 7 of that document states —
Fertility Enhancement
You can include in medical expenses the cost of the following procedures performed on yourself, your spouse, or your dependent to overcome an inability to have children.
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- Procedures such as in vitro fertilization (including temporary storage of eggs or sperm).
- Surgery, including an operation to reverse prior surgery that prevented the person operated on from having children.
Help with IVF's high cost: That's good tax news for prospective parents, since a single cycle IVF treatment costs, depending on where you live, more than $25,000.
That cost is compounded by the fact that the first IVF cycle isn't successful for most patients, meaning they must undergo second (or more) treatments.
Data show that the average patient spends close to $50,000 in order to have a child.
Recordkeeping key: As with all tax deduction claims, record keeping is key. It's even more important when you are writing off an unusually large amount like IVF costs.
Hang on to all treatment receipts, statements, itemized invoices, and other material that supports your expense claim.
The bills or other materials should include the name and address of any provider or other entity you paid, the date of the treatment and payment, and, of course, the amount paid.
If you have to travel for the treatment, the amounts you pay for meals and lodging at a hospital or similar facility also are deductible as medical expenses. Note the in hospital requirement. Meal costs outside of the medical facility are not deductible.
And, of course, keep a mileage log of your auto travel for IVF or other medical treatment. You can deduct that cost, too.
If you choose the standard mileage options, that's 22 cents per mile on 2023 tax returns. The per-mile deduction rate drops to 21 cents for 2024 tax year medical travel.
Finally, while you do want to claim all the allowable deductions you can, don't go overboard. The IRS doesn't accept expenses that are merely beneficial to general health, such as vitamins or a vacation, regardless of how much you know you need it.
You also might find these items of interest:
- Diving into swimming pool medical (and other) tax savings
- Medical tax provisions' inflation adjustments could be a tax-cutting Rx
- IRS announces high-deductible health plan, HSA & HRA inflation bumps for 2024
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