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I would like to wish osteopathy registrants a happy new year for 2016. I would also like to thank the Osteopathy Board, the Board’s accreditation council (Australasian Osteopathic Accreditation Council), the stakeholders we interacted with during the last year, and AHPRA staff for their continued interest in and great support of regulation of osteopathy in Australia.
Attendance at the Osteopathic International Alliance conference in Montreal in September affirmed for me how fortunate we are in Australia to have our current system of the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme (the National Scheme). There is always a strong interest in our approach from European countries, Canada and the US. For some countries, such as Canada, which has a similar federated system of government, the interest is in how we have achieved and implemented an approach that is both national and multi-professional. Some countries are still trying to achieve full regulation (as opposed to self-regulation), or do not have title protection.
It was a great opportunity to hold formal meetings with regulators, accreditors and stakeholders from Australia, New Zealand and the UK. In 2016 we will work closely with the regulators in the United Kingdom and New Zealand, in particular, to share ideas for best practice regulation.
Dr Nikole Grbin Osteopath Chair, Osteopathy Board of Australia
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The Board has published revised registration standards, which come into effect in this registration year and replace the existing standards. Registration standards define the requirements that applicants and registrants need to meet to be registered.
There are some important changes to these registration standards and guidelines and the Board expects all registered osteopaths to read and understand the revised documents. Reading the Board’s registration standards, codes and guidelines and overview of the National Law1 – particularly when new or updated versions are published – can be recorded in your CPD portfolio and counted as part of the four hours of mandatory CPD that must be done each year.
The revised registration standards and commencement dates are:
The recency of practice registration standard has changes which include the following:
The CPD registration standard has had some small revisions – to meet this registration standard, you must:
1The Health Practitioner Regulation National Law, as in force in each state and territory.
The Board’s revised CPD guidelines came into effect at the same time as the CPD registration standard on 1 December 2015.
The most important change is that osteopaths will no longer be required to complete an annual refresher of CPR, but will still have to refresh the senior first aid certificate at the minimum standard of a Senior First Aid (level 2) every three years.
In each 12-month CPD cycle, you must complete the following mandatory activity, which is to undertake at least four hours’ CPD on any combination of one or more of the following topics from the refreshed list:
The Board expects you to cover different mandatory topics from year to year.
At the back of the revised guidelines are template CPD portfolio forms to assist practitioners to plan and regularly record their CPD activities. These templates are now available in Word and can be filled out and stored electronically or in hard copy. CPD records must now be kept for five years.
The Board has published the revised Professional indemnity insurance arrangements registration standard which will take effect on 1 July 2016. The revised registration standard and a fact sheet are published on the Board’s website under Registration standards.
The Board also has a news item on the website which explains the main changes, when these will come into effect, and when the obligations will need to be met.
The standards were revised after a scheduled review, which included public consultation. The Board publishes the submissions to the public consultation on the Past consultations web page. Three registration standards for registered osteopaths were revised by the Board and approved by the Australian Health Workforce Ministerial Council (AHWMC) on 27 August 2015.
The following additional resources about the revised standards are available on the AHPRA Registration standards pages for CPD, recency of practice and PII.
We have a graduate video that has been published recently by the Board. It outlines what graduates need to do before they can register and practise as osteopaths, and what they need to do to renew their registration each year once they are registered.
The Board has also published a PowerPoint, Osteopathy registration: what you need to know. It explains in further detail the information touched on in the video. This video and other information for students and graduates is available on the Student registration page of the Board’s website.
The video can be watched on YouTube.
Please check your advertising messages by reading the Board’s bulletin on advertising compliance, published in June 2015, and the Guidelines for advertising of regulated health services. The Osteopathy Board has developed materials for practitioners to use and for the public to read about responsible advertising of osteopathy services
Reading about advertising regulation can count towards the four hours of mandatory CPD and will help you remain compliant.
In 2014/15 there were 24 advertising complaints about osteopathy services made to AHPRA and the Board.
Renewal of registration for osteopaths ended on 31 December 2015. Of the 98.34% of practitioners who renewed, 97.6% did so online. This high rate of online renewal reflects the trend for all renewing practitioners across the National Scheme.
The Board will publish its next quarterly data update in March. For previous updates on the registered workforce, see the Board’s Statistics page.
A new video and an accompanying infographic explaining the Australia-wide scheme that is in place to protect members of the public has recently been launched by AHPRA.
Working in partnership with the 14 National Boards, AHPRA helps regulate Australia’s 630,000-plus registered health practitioners through a national scheme.
The video explains how the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme (National Scheme) works and how patients are protected.
Both resources are available on the What we do page of the AHPRA website. The video can also be watched on AHPRA’s YouTube channel.
The 2014/15 annual report of AHPRA and the National Boards has been published.
The report details the work of the National Boards and AHPRA in implementing the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme over the 12 months to 30 June 2015.
There are now more than 637,218 health practitioners registered to practise in Australia, from 14 different professions, representing overall growth of 2.9% over the past year.
The report is available on AHPRA’s Annual report mini-site.
AHPRA has published a news item that outlines employers’ obligations, and has advertisements running on LinkedIn and Facebook. This is the first step in the campaign, with many more activities to follow, including direct mail, paid print advertising, and in-language advertising (for the public campaign).
The campaign will be rolled out in stages and has three target audiences and objectives:
There are health practitioners with a history of substance misuse who have restrictions placed on their registration. These restrictions are generally designed to keep the public safe while the practitioner remains in practice.
When restrictions are placed on a health practitioner’s registration, AHPRA monitors the practitioner to make sure they are complying with the restrictions. This process is referred to as ‘monitoring and compliance’.
From November 2015, all health practitioners who have restrictions placed on their registration by the Board as a result of past substance misuse will have routine quarterly hair testing, in addition to random urine testing. Routine hair testing provides additional information about the use of a wide range of drugs, over a longer time period. It therefore provides greater assurance to the Board that the practitioner is not impaired as a result of ongoing substance misuse.
More information is available in the AHPRA news item.