Healthscope chief executive Robert Cooke said the government has done a poor job at selling its proposed $7 co-payment for medical care and warned its application to pathology would cause an administrative headache.

Presenting his first set of results following Healthscope's $3.6 billion float a month ago, Mr Cooke said he supported co-payment for visits to a general practitioner, especially with a safety net that kicks in after 10 visits.

But he said the government had stumbled in its attempt to promote the proposal.

"Obviously the sales messaging of this, [and] this is a personal view, it's been pretty poorly handled and there are lots of confusing messages out there," he told an analyst call.

The co-payment would impact Healthscope's medical centre and pathology operations.

It runs 46 centres and has pathology in Victoria, South Australia, NSW and Queensland, although these businesses contributed only 7 per cent of group earnings.

Mr Cooke said the co-payment could reduce pathology earnings by about $2 million because of difficulties around payments.

Healthscope conducts about 200,000 tests in nursing homes each year where no money changes hands.

"You can write some pretty horrific administrative scenarios here," he said.

Mr Cooke told Fairfax Media that he has raised the issues with the Coalition, via the industry association.

A co-payment was "inevitable", he said.

"But the amount and the implementation of it is going to require some finesse by government."

Following the company's July listing, Healthscope met prospectus targets and recorded a full-year net loss after tax of $19.3 million.

Its preferred metric of operating earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation rose 10.5 per cent to $375.7 million . Operating EBITDA adds back tax and finance costs, as well as $31.7 million in costs related to the initial public offering.

Revenue rose 5.1 per cent to $2.3 billion. Operating EBIT rose 11.2 per cent to $262.3 million.

In its statutory forecasts listed in the prospectus the company said it would have revenue of $2.3 billion, EBIT of $198.3 million and a net loss of $145.1 million. The smaller loss was due to a change in how Healthscope dealt with shareholder loans related to the company structure prior to the IPO.

Healthscope shares had fallen 1.1 per cent to $2.24 at 2.04pm AEST. They are still trading above the $2.10 listing price.

"As you would hope and expect nothing has changed in the last month or so that detracts from our confidence in our FY15 forecasts and the future of the business," Mr Cooke said.

Healthscope returned to public ownership just under four years after private equity funds TPG and The Carlyle Group bought the business for $2.7 billion. It was the biggest float since the $4.6 billion privatisation of rail freight business QR National in 2010.