Consulting the professions 

The Professions Reference Group (PRG) met six times. It was chaired by Ms Julianne Bryce from the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation from July to December 2024, and by Dr Zena Burgess from the Australian Psychological Society from February to June 2025. 

The PRG brings together professional associations for each of the regulated health professions. It provided feedback on our strategies to proactively respond to emerging public safety concerns, implementation of our new operating system, and our review of parental leave and registration fees. 

Ahpra also updated PRG members on our work to identify and minimise distress for practitioners involved in a notifications process, the development of National Law amendments, graduate registration and practitioner renewal campaigns, and our accreditation work.

Strengthening consumer voices 

We continued to strengthen our engagement with communities across Australia. Central to this effort was the Community Advisory Council (CAC), which remained our primary source of consumer and community representation. 

CAC members provided advice on how and where consumer voices should be heard, with a particular focus on communities who, for different reasons, have difficulty accessing health services. CAC members participated in recruitment panels for the National Boards; contributed to committees, reference groups and stakeholder events; and supported the development of standards, codes, guidelines and policies. 

The CAC presented feedback on a wide range of initiatives, including: 

• Ahpra’s notifications process webpage and explanatory videos 
• the Medical Training Survey consultative forum 
• expedited pathways for international medical, nursing and allied health graduates 
• the National Health Practitioner Ombudsman’s own-motion investigation into delays and procedural fairness 
• outcome-based accreditation safeguards and a range of patient safety reforms 
• the Independent review of complexity in the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme (the Dawson review). 

Members also actively contributed to the National Scheme Combined Meeting program, championing the inclusion of public perspectives in health regulation and promoting meaningful engagement by inviting and involving diverse viewpoints. 

The CAC met eight times during the year. We thank Ms Patricia Hall for her leadership as Chair, which concluded on 30 June. Meeting communiqués are published on our website. 

Shared policy issues 

The National Boards and Ahpra regularly collaborate on shared policy issues that affect the health professions similarly. This supports effective interprofessional care, helps to simplify regulation, and makes it easier for the public, practitioners and employers to know what to expect of registered health practitioners. 

Our areas of focus this year included: 

• implementing a revised common English language skills registration standard for 13 National Boards which incorporates key recommendations of the Kruk review and aims to improve flexibility for applicants to meet the standard at initial registration, while maintaining public protection. This was supported by new online resources, including a pathway selection tool to help applicants understand how they can meet the standard 
• beginning a program of work to build health workforce capability in family, domestic and sexual violence, at the request of health ministers. 

Family, domestic and sexual violence 

As trusted members of their communities, Australia’s registered health practitioners have a unique opportunity to recognise and respond to family, domestic and sexual violence (FDSV). Health practitioners play an important role in the early detection, support, referral and documentation of incidents, and in enabling access to effective healthcare for victim-survivors, people who use violence, and their families and carers. 

In August, health ministers requested that we implement a suite of initiatives aimed at building health workforce capability to recognise and respond to FDSV. Our action plan is focused on three streams of work: 

• Building the capability of the health workforce to recognise and respond to FDSV. 
• Regulatory responses to health practitioners who use violence. 
• Building our capacity to understand the dynamics of FDSV and engage with victim-survivors in a trauma-informed way. 

We are committed to taking action to help end FDSV in our communities. This work is being undertaken progressively, with an initial focus on work we can achieve within existing regulatory frameworks that will set the foundation for future work. Over the past year, we have: 

• published a joint statement from Ahpra, the National Boards and co-regulatory authorities in Queensland and New South Wales declaring that perpetrating family violence is unacceptable and can lead to regulatory action for registered health practitioners 
• rolled out a mandatory training module on FDSV for Ahpra staff 
• published guidance, with the independent Accreditation Committee, on developing professional capabilities 
• worked closely with the Domestic, Family and Sexual Violence Commission. This included consulting with its Lived Experience Advisory Council in the development of the joint statement and work on exploring the potential to expand our Notifier Support Service to support victim-survivors of FDSV making a complaint to us about a health practitioner’s conduct or performance. 

Policy consultations 

Throughout the year, the National Boards and Ahpra together provided input to the following external policy consultations and reviews: 

• Australian Bureau of Statistics review of the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations 
• Occupation Standard Classification for Australia (OSCA) review of OSCA Maintenance Strategy 
• Parliamentary Committee on the Health Care Complaints Commission (NSW) review of the HCCC’s 2021/22 and 2022/23 annual reports 
• NSW Health review of the Health Practitioner Regulation (NSW) Regulation 2016 
  • Department of Health and Aged Care consultations on: Safe and Responsible Artificial Intelligence in Health Care – Legislation and Regulation Review 
  • draft National Allied Health Workforce Strategy 
• Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) consultation on: 
  • Clarifying and strengthening the regulation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) 
  • targeted external consultation: Institution of legal provisions to share Special Access Scheme and Authorised Prescriber Scheme information with specified external stakeholders 
• Australian Medicinal Cannabis Association review of Draft Code of Conduct and Guidance document for medical cannabis prescribers 
• Jobs and Skills Australia (JSA) consultation on Occupation Shortage List 
• NSW Ministry of Health consultations on: 
  • Review of Part 8 of the NSW National Law and the operation of the complaints process in NSW 
  • Draft Health Practitioner Regulation (NSW) Regulation 2025
• The Treasury review of Tax regulator secrecy exceptions 
• Queensland Health consultation on Medical Cannabis in Queensland 
• Parliament of Australia, Community Affairs Legislation Committee consultation on Health Legislation Amendment (Improved Medicare Integrity and Other Measures) Bill 2025 [Provisions]. 

National Law amendments 

Ahpra and the National Boards are implementing the next group of changes to the National Law over the next 12 months. The Health Practitioner Regulation National Law and Other Legislation Amendment Bill was passed by Queensland Parliament and became law on 9 April. The key changes include:

• Permanently publishing information on the Register of practitioners if a tribunal finds a practitioner engaged in professional misconduct involving sexual misconduct
• Stronger protections against reprisal for people who raise concerns with us
• Requiring all practitioners to get a reinstatement order before they can seek re-registration after being cancelled or disqualified
• Making it clear that non-disclosure agreements cannot stop a person from raising their concerns about a practitioner with us.

These changes align with the range of reforms that we are progressing as part of our actions to improve public safety regarding sexual misconduct in healthcare. 

It is important that sufficient time is taken to explain these changes to practitioners and the public. They also have an impact on our operations. The changes will start nationally on a date, or dates, to be decided by governments.

Government relations 

Ahpra maintains strong relationships with national, state and territory health departments. A key part of this is the Jurisdictional Advisory Committee, which meets quarterly to advise on routine National Scheme matters requiring decisions by health ministers. 

We continued to participate by invitation in Senate budget estimates hearings. This is an important opportunity to inform senators about our work and performance, and to address any questions or concerns. 

Over the past 12 months, we have made significant contributions to the Independent review of complexity in the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme, also known as the Dawson review. The final report by independent reviewer Ms Sue Dawson is expected to be delivered to health ministers later in 2025.

Contributing internationally 

Ahpra is a designated World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Health Workforce Regulation. We collaborate to strengthen the regulatory capacity and professional competencies of health workforce regulators across the WHO Western Pacific Region. We lead the Western Pacific Regional Network of Health Workforce Regulators, which includes representatives from more than 20 countries. 

Over the past year, we hosted four regional webinars on regulatory challenges and welcomed several international delegations to exchange insights on health practitioner regulation. 

We also deepened our global partnerships with leading regulatory bodies, including the International Association of Medical Regulatory Authorities and the Council on Licensure, Enforcement and Regulation, fostering shared learning and collaboration.

Projects 

We rely on research, evaluation and data to inform our work in health practitioner regulation. To support the ethical conduct of research, we established relationships with two additional Human Research Ethics Committees. We continued to build our research portfolio through a variety of projects, including those that investigate practitioners’ and the public’s trust and confidence in our work, and identified ways we can improve. 

Our research and evaluation projects (with information on Human Research Ethics Committee approvals) included: 

• exploring factors associated with the retention and attrition of nine health professions, and analysing workforce demographic snapshots (Metro North Health, approved) 
• exploring notifier and practitioner experiences with Ahpra regulatory processes over time (Metro North Health, approved) 
• exploring trends in communication-related notifications (ACT Health, exempted) 
• surveying practitioners for Project REACH to understand trust and confidence in the National Scheme (ACT Health, approved) 
• exploring English language skills required for registration as a health practitioner in Australia (SA Health, approved) 
• a case study of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Accreditation Council on embedding registration requirements for English language skills in accreditation standards (SA Health, approved) 
• a study to improve the regulatory experience of regional, remote and overseas-trained practitioners (SA Health, approved) 
• evaluating the Notifier Support Service (Metro North Health, approved) 
• evaluating the impact of the Health Management Team (Metro North Health, approved) 
  • conducting multiple literature reviews, including: contemporary evidence on enhancing English language standards for internationally qualified health practitioners (scoping review) 
  • language attrition after English language skills test validity period (rapid review) 
  • consumer navigator services (rapid review) 
  • managing high-risk practitioners with substance use disorder (rapid review) 
  • support for victim-survivors of family violence during a regulatory process –international comparison (rapid review). 

Publications 

We wrote or contributed to four publications in peer-reviewed journals: 

• Evans J, Piech K, Saar E et al (2024) ‘Supporting victim-survivors during investigations of health practitioner misconduct: early learnings from a trauma-informed service’, BMJ Open Quality, doi.org/10.1136/bmjoq-2024-002765 
• Fuller J, Browning M, Evans J et al (2024) ‘How to attract, retain and grow the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health workforce in Australia: A self-determined approach’, Asia Pacific Journal of Health Management, doi.org/10.24083/apjhm. v19i3.4163 
• Fletcher M, Stark S, Balvin N et al (2025) ‘Holding up the crystal ball: using regulatory intelligence insights to support quality in healthcare’, International Journal for Quality in Health Care, doi.org/10.1093/intqhc/mzaf001 
• Tan J, Divakar R, Barclay L et al (2025) ‘Trends in retention and attrition in nine regulated health professions in Australia’, Australian Health Review, doi.org/10.1071/AH24268.

Access to data for research 

The comprehensive national data that Ahpra collects have demographic, commercial and research value and value for workforce planning. Our data access and research policy and the information on our website set out the data already available and how to access them, and the processes for requesting data that are not publicly available. We are not able to meet all requests for information, as both the National Law and the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) impose strict limits on the use of our data. 

We also provide a data-matching service to Australian universities wishing to track graduate outcomes. Ahpra can match a graduate’s student number to their registration number so the university does not have to manually search the Register of practitioners. This enables universities to determine whether they are meeting their funding requirements and the intended outcomes of their rural training programs by determining how many of their health students are working in regional and rural locations. Some universities also use the register to assess graduate outcomes more broadly in metropolitan and rural areas. We received and fulfilled nine requests for student data matching in 2024/25. 

Each year, Ahpra provides an extract of medical practitioner data from the Register of practitioners to Medical Deans, who combine it with their own data from surveys of final-year medical students. Including Ahpra’s data with their own allows Medical Deans to display information about medical practitioners that is broken down by a range of demographic factors, such as gender, rurality, specialty and graduates’ preferred versus actual work locations.