31st July 2026 - 5 min read
Medical expenses fall under three separate tax reliefs, capped at RM10,000, RM8,000, and RM6,000. These are the rules for YA 2026, which you will file in 2027, and some of them differ from the return you filed earlier this year.
The relief an expense falls under depends mainly on who it was for, such as yourself, your child, your parents, or a disabled dependant.
You can qualify for more than one of these in the same year, as each has its own claim limit.
| Relief | Limit (YA 2026) | Who you can claim for |
| Medical expenses | RM10,000 | Self, spouse, child |
| Medical expenses for parents or grandparents | RM8,000 | Parents, grandparents |
| Supporting equipment for the disabled | RM6,000 | Self, spouse, child, parent |
Someone caring for an ageing parent while also treating a serious illness in the family could draw on two of these at once, each up to its own separate cap.
This is the largest of the three and the one most people mean when they talk about medical relief. It is a single shared cap, and several different types of expense compete for the same RM10,000.
Serious disease treatment sits at the centre of it. According to LHDN, qualifying conditions include cancer, kidney failure, leukaemia, heart attack, Parkinson’s, pulmonary hypertension, and major organ transplant. Fertility treatment, including IVF and IUI, also falls under this relief, though it is only available to married individuals.
The RM10,000 limit contains several sub-limits, each with its own maximum claim amount.
| Sub-limit | Cap | What it covers |
| Learning disability services | RM10,000 | Assessment, diagnosis, early intervention, and rehabilitation for a child aged 18 and below |
| Check-up and mental health | RM1,000 | Full medical check-up, consultation with a registered psychiatrist, clinical psychologist, or registered counsellor, Covid-19 tests, and registered self-testing devices |
| Vaccination | RM1,000 | Vaccination expenses includes:(i) Pneumococcal;(ii) Human papillomavirus (HPV);(iii) Influenza;(iv) Rotavirus;(v) Varicella;(vi) Meningococcal;(vii) Combination of tetanus-diphtheria-acellular-pertussis (Tdap); and(viii) Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) |
| Dental | RM1,000 | Dental examination and treatment |
Because these sub-limits make up the RM10,000, spending RM1,000 on a check-up and RM1,000 on vaccinations uses up RM2,000 of your RM10,000. It does not give you RM12,000 to claim.
The learning disability limit rose from RM6,000 to RM10,000. A parent claiming assessment, diagnosis, early intervention, or rehabilitation for a child aged 18 and below can now use the entire shared cap on that alone. It still comes out of the same RM10,000 as everything else, so a family claiming both a serious illness and learning disability support will reach the ceiling faster than the headline figure suggests.
The vaccination relief has also been expanded. Instead of being limited to a specific list of named vaccines, it now covers any vaccine registered with the National Pharmaceutical Regulatory Agency. This brings in vaccines that were previously excluded, such as travel jabs for typhoid or hepatitis A, and shingles.
The medical relief is for the conditions on LHDN’s list, not for everyday consultations, so a General Practitioner (GP) visit or over-the-counter medicine is out unless it forms part of treatment for a qualifying illness.
Cosmetic procedures do not count either. Reconstructive surgery can, but only where a medical practitioner prescribes it as part of treatment for a condition, such as breast reconstruction after a mastectomy.
Spectacles and optical lenses are not claimable, and neither are consumer wearables that happen to track your health. Self-testing devices registered under the Medical Devices Act, such as a glucometer or a blood pressure monitor, can qualify, but they come out of the RM1,000 check-up sub-limit rather than the wider RM10,000, and a smartwatch does not count at all.
Medical expenses for your parents or grandparents sit under their own relief, capped at RM8,000.
This relief covers medical treatment, dental treatment, special needs, or carer expenses, including care at a registered nursing home or home-based nursing. A full medical check-up and vaccinations are included too, with a RM1,000 sub-limit.
To qualify, your parents or grandparents must be Malaysian residents and receive treatment in Malaysia where their condition must be certified by a registered medical practitioner. If you are claiming carer expenses, remember that the carer cannot be you, your spouse, or your child.
A separate RM6,000 relief is available for supporting equipment for a disabled person. Wheelchairs, hearing aids, artificial limbs, and dialysis machines all qualify, for yourself, your spouse, your child, or your parent. To claim it, the disabled person must be registered with the Department of Social Welfare first.
Say that over the year you spent RM3,200 on your mother’s dental surgery, RM1,800 on your father’s cardiology follow-up, and RM800 on your own full medical check-up.
| What you spent on | Claimed | Relief | Cap |
| Mother’s dental surgery (RM3,200), father’s cardiology follow-up (RM1,800) | RM5,000 | Parents and grandparents | RM8,000 |
| Your own check-up (RM800) | RM800 | Medical expenses, self, spouse, child | RM10,000 |
Your own RM800 check-up qualifies because it falls within the RM1,000 check-up sub-limit. It remains separate from your parents’ RM8,000 limit, while their RM5,000 claim will not affect your own RM10,000 limit.
LHDN can ask for supporting documents up to seven years after you file. For any medical claim you need an official receipt, and for the medical and parents’ reliefs you also need written certification from a registered medical or dental practitioner confirming the treatment.
One mistake to avoid is claiming the same expense under two reliefs. Before you open MyTax, sort your receipts by who the expense was for. That makes it much easier to match each expense to the correct relief.
For every other relief you can claim, see our full list of reliefs.
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Pugaleshwaran Raja Kumaran is a Tax Executive Director at ThinkTX Consultants, with over a decade of experience delivering strategic and practical tax solutions. He advises high-net-worth individuals, multinational corporations, and growing businesses, helping them manage complex tax matters with clarity and confidence.
He has extensive experience across a broad range of tax engagements, including corporate tax compliance, Capital Gains Tax (CGT), withholding tax, stamp duty, Real Property Gains Tax (RPGT), Sales and Service Tax (SST), and advisory on inbound and outbound investments. He also leads practice areas covering tax incentives, tax audits and investigations, private client advisory, tax due diligence, and e-Invoicing advisory, providing comprehensive support across the business life cycle.
Beyond client advisory, Pugaleshwaran actively contributes to the tax profession through writing and speaking on Malaysian tax policy, regulatory developments, and industry best practices. His work has been published by the International Bureau of Fiscal Documentation (IBFD) and Wolters Kluwer (CCH), including contributions to Malaysia’s Sales and Service Tax (SST) content updates.
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As a trusted tax partner of RinggitPlus, Pugaleshwaran reviews and verifies Malaysian taxation content to ensure it is accurate, compliant, and relevant for everyday Malaysians.
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