Revised registration standards take effect from today

01 Dec 2015

Revised registration standards for continuing professional development (CPD) and recency of practice take effect today.

The Osteopathy Board of Australia has previously published the contents of the revised standards and supporting materials to help osteopaths understand the new requirements.

The revised registration standards¹ and guidelines now in effect are:

• Registration Standard: Continuing professional development (CPD) 
• Registration Standard: Recency of practice 
• Guidelines: CPD

The revised standards will apply to most applicants for initial registration, and applicants for renewal of registration from 1 October 2016 (when the 2016 renewal period commences). They do not apply to the current cycle of renewals.

For Recency of practice, the main change to the requirements is that the minimum hours to maintain recent practice has been increased from 400 to 450 hours in the previous three years. Some definitions have also changed, including the definition of ‘recent graduate’ which has changed to encompass graduates within the last 12 months, extended from graduates in the last six months.

For CPD, the registration standard now requires a person to maintain records of CPD activity for five years in case of audit. The requirement to undertake a 12 month refresher of CPR has been removed from the revised CPD Guidelines, however the requirement in the registration standard to hold a current senior first aid certificate at the minimum standard of a Senior First Aid (level 2) certificate or equivalent, updated every three years, is unchanged. The list of mandatory CPD activities has been refreshed in the revised CPD Guidelines.

For more information on the changes made to these registration standards, see the Board’s news item.

The standards were revised after a scheduled review, which included public consultation. National Boards have previously published consultation reports providing a summary of the consultation processes, rationale for any changes and proposed way forward, including areas where further work is planned.

Please refer to AHPRA’s registration standards page for additional information and resources.

For more information

• Lodge an online enquiry form 
• For registration enquiries: 1300 419 495 (within Australia) +61 3 9275 9009 (overseas callers) 
• For media enquiries: (03) 8708 9200

¹Registration standards define the requirements that applicants and registrants in the regulated professions need to meet to be registered.