Registration Standards

December 2024

Ahpra and National Boards (except for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Practice Board of Australia) have published advance copies of the revised Registration standards: English Language Skills (the ELS standards). These include:

the Common English language skills standard which applies to all applicants for initial registration in Chinese medicine, chiropractic, dental, medical, medical radiation, occupational therapy, optometry, osteopathy, pharmacy, physiotherapy, podiatry and psychology, and
the Nursing and Midwifery ELS standard, which applies to all applicants for initial registration as enrolled nurses, registered nurses and midwives.

Advance copies of the ELS standards are available on the Ahpra website. Please note that the 2015 ELS standards will remain current until the revised ELS standards come into effect by April 2025. We are focusing on improving the applicant experience and will provide more specific information about when the standard will come into effect in early 2025.

Read the news item for further information about the updates to the ELS standard and what you need to know about any changes before they come into effect.

Registration standards define the requirements that applicants, registrants or students need to meet to be registered. The Osteopathy Board of Australia has developed the following registration standards:

Document name	PDF	Accessible format	Date of effect
Continuing Professional Development Registration Standard	PDF (144KB)	Word version (53.8KB,DOCX)	1 December 2015
Criminal History Registration Standard	PDF (249KB)	Word version (574KB,DOCX)	1 July 2015
English Language Skills Registration Standard There is currently no profession-specific Occupational English Test (OET) for osteopaths. The Board has agreed that an OET test from another profession regulated under the National Scheme that meets the requirements as set out in the English language skills registration standard, will be accepted.	PDF (375KB)	Word version (577KB,DOCX)	1 July 2015
Registration Standard: Professional Indemnity Insurance Arrangements Additional information about this standard is available on the AHPRA website.	PDF (269KB)	Word version (85.1KB,DOCX)	1 July 2016
Recency of Practice Registration Standard	PDF (162KB)	Word version (372KB,DOCX)	1 December 2015

For more information, please see FAQ and Fact Sheets.

The Board holds public consultations where interested persons can provide feedback to help shape Registration Standards, Codes and Guidelines, and policies. For more information, please go to the current consultations page.

Ministerial Council directions and approvals

The following directions or approvals given by Ministerial Council to the Osteopathy Board of Australia are published in accordance with section 17(2) of the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law as in force in each state and territory (the National Law).

Document name	PDF	Document date
Ministerial Council approval letters for the following registration standards are published on the AHPRA website: Continuing Professional Development Recency of Practice Professional Indemnity Insurance Arrangements	N/A	7 September 2015
Ministerial Council approval letters for the following registration standards are published on the AHPRA website: Criminal history English language skills	N/A	30 April 2015
Approval of the following registration standards: Criminal history registration standard English language requirements registration standard Professional indemnity insurance arrangements registration standard Continuing professional development registration standard Recency of practice registration standard.	PDF (243KB)	31/03/2010

Retired versions

Document name	PDF	Document date
Retired version: Professional Indemnity Insurance Registration Standard	PDF (227KB)	To 30 June 2016
Retired version: Criminal History Registration Standard	PDF (332KB)	To 30 June 2015
Retired version: English Language Skills Registration Standard	PDF (333KB)	To 30 June 2015
Retired version: Continuing Professional Development Registration Standard	PDF (227KB)	To 30 November 2015
Retired version: Recency of Practice Registration Standard	PDF (330KB)	To 30 November 2015

Exemption from Web Content Accessibility Guidelines

The following documents have been made available on this website in compliance with the National Law and also in the interest of transparency. Wherever possible, the Osteopathy Board of Australia provides web content in accessible formats. However in cases where the documents have been provided by other parties, accessible format files may not be available or be approved for use.

If you have difficulty accessing one of these documents, please contact AHPRA at webservices@ahpra.gov.au, and we will attempt to provide you with an accessible version.