Practitioners, stakeholders and the community have until 14 February 2023 to provide feedback on an Ahpra review of healthcare professional’s accreditation arrangements for the next five years.
The National Boards and the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (Ahpra) are reviewing the current accreditation arrangements for the national health practitioner regulatory scheme to prepare for the 2024–2029 period.
They released a public consultation paper on 14 December 2022.
“Accreditation is a core regulatory function in the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme. Accreditation authorities play an important role in the supply of new qualified, safe and competent health practitioners,” Ahpra said.
This involves two processes – program accreditation and practitioner assessment.
“Program accreditation is the process of assessing whether a health practitioner education program and the education provider that provides the program produce graduates who have the knowledge, skills and professional attributes to safely and competently practise the profession in Australia,” the regulator said.
“Practitioner assessment is the process of assessing whether an overseas-qualified practitioner has demonstrated the knowledge, clinical skills, and professional attributes to safely and competently practise the profession in Australia.”
The current accreditation arrangements end on 30 June 2024 for all professions except paramedicine, which end on 30 November 2023.
The National Boards and Ahpra intend to complete the scheduled review by May 2023 to inform National Boards’ decisions on arrangements for the next period and provide certainty for the future.
The last scheduled review and public consultation on accreditation arrangements was in 2018.
The review aims to confirm performance and progress on current accreditation priorities and will inform the priorities for the next period, including how progress in priority areas could be measured, Ahpra stated.
In addition to general feedback, the National Boards and Ahpra are interested in stakeholders’ feedback on specific questions about the accreditation arrangements including on performance and progress since mid-2019, and possible areas of focus for the next five-years, including how progress in these areas could be measured.
Feedback can be provided in two ways by close of business on 14 February 2023.
- use the response template published on the consultation webpage to record feedback and return it by email to accreditationreview@ahpra.gov.au, and/or
- send a written submission by email to accreditationreview@ahpra.gov.au.
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