November 2023

Issue 33 - November 2023

• From the Chair
• Priority news
  • New strengthened guidance for paediatric care
• Board news
  • Renew on time to avoid late fees
• Registration news
  • Latest workforce data released
• Students and graduates
  • Finishing your study this year? Apply for registration now!
• Regulation at work
  • Chiropractor reprimanded and conditions imposed following inappropriate relationship with a patient
• What’s new?
  • New complaints checklist launched
  • Work to eliminate racism from Australian healthcare recognised internationally
• Check out the latest podcasts
• National Scheme news
• Want more information?

From the Chair

Welcome to the Board’s newsletter.

In August, I was pleased to be reappointed as Chair of the Chiropractic Board for a fourth term. It is an honour to lead the Board and continue to contribute to the regulation of chiropractors in Australia.

The Board launches its revised and strengthened Statement on paediatric care today. The Board is pleased to update its guidance and remove the Interim policy on spinal manipulation for infants and young children – read more below.

Thanks to those who have renewed their registration already. There’s a short window still open before late fees apply so please renew before 30 November. See below for more details.

The Board wishes everyone a safe and happy holiday season.

Dr Wayne Minter AM
Chair, Chiropractic Board of Australia

Priority news

New strengthened guidance for paediatric care

The new Statement on paediatric care has been published by the Board, after considering the recommendations made by the Safer Care Victoria independent review into chiropractic spinal manipulation of children under 12 years. The Board also considered community needs and expectations and, specifically, the strong support for consumer choice voiced in the public consultation of the independent review.

The Board examined how common themes in the independent review’s recommendations align with its existing regulatory guidance, and used these insights to inform a risk-based approach to updating its Statement on paediatric care. This includes updated advice reinforcing the need to ensure that parents or guardians fully understand their rights and the evidence before treatment is provided to children.

The revised statement takes effect from today and replaces the Interim policy on spinal manipulation for infants and young children, which has been in place since 2019.

Read more about the revised statement on paediatric care in the news item.

Board news

Renew on time to avoid late fees

Renewal time is upon us! Chiropractors, you have until 30 November 2023 to renew your general or non-practising registration on time. Renewing on time also means you’ll avoid late fees.

The Board has announced a freeze in the annual registration fee for chiropractors for 2023/24.

The registration fee of $451 applies from 20 September. This will cover the registration period from 1 December 2023 to 30 November 2024.

Read more about fees in the news item.

Ready to renew?

Head to the Registration renewal webpage to renew. Renewal is now online-only.

If you submit your application on time or during the following one-month late period, you can continue practising while your application is assessed.

If you don’t renew by the end of the late period, 31 December 2023, your registration will lapse, you’ll be removed from the Register of practitioners, and you won’t be able to use the protected title ‘chiropractor’.

Registration news

Latest workforce data released

The Board’s latest quarterly registration data report covers the period to 30 September 2023. At this date there were 6,368 registered chiropractors, including 414 with non-practising registration.

For further data broken down by age, gender and principal place of practice, visit the Board’s Statistics page to read the report.

Students and graduates

Finishing your study this year? Apply for registration now!

Graduates set to complete their course this year can take the first step in their new health career by applying for registration now.

Applying before you finish studying means we can start assessing your application while we wait for your graduate results.

Registration with the Chiropractic Board of Australia is required before you can call yourself a chiropractor – and means you can work anywhere in Australia.

Watch our video to get your application right

Be sure to view the video on Applying for graduate registration. You’ll also find helpful advice, tips for avoiding common causes of delay, and downloadable information flyers on the Graduate applications page of the Ahpra website.

New support team for Indigenous applicants

A new Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Engagement and Support team (the support team) was recently established and is staffed by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Part of their role is to help Indigenous applicants, including new graduates, through the registration process.

The support team provides a one-on-one service, which includes providing helpful tips for navigating the registration process, being in regular phone contact with applicants, updating registrants on relevant work being done in the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme around cultural safety, and providing advice on disclosures made on registration applications (for example, about impairments) that may require consideration by the Board.

The support team is committed to helping you get registered promptly so you can start making vital contributions to safe healthcare and to your communities. If you would still like help with your application for registration, please email the team at mobengagementsupport@ahpra.gov.au.

Regulation at work

Chiropractor reprimanded and conditions imposed following inappropriate relationship with a patient

A Queensland chiropractor has been reprimanded and had conditions imposed on his registration after he failed to maintain appropriate professional boundaries with a patient by engaging in a personal/sexual relationship with the patient shortly following the start of a therapeutic relationship.

Read more in the news item.

What’s new?

New complaints checklist launched

A new checklist for registered health practitioners aims to help them better address complaints when they are first raised by a patient or client.

The checklist is an outcome of a joint project between the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care, Ahpra and the 15 National Boards that regulate registered health practitioners. Consumers, health complaints bodies, professional organisations and indemnity insurers were consulted in the development of the checklist.

The checklist aims to better equip practitioners to handle patient complaints and to resolve issues quickly and effectively when they are first raised.

Read more in the news item.

Work to eliminate racism from Australian healthcare recognised internationally

The Council on Licensure, Enforcement and Regulation (CLEAR) serves and supports the international regulatory community. Its global membership promotes regulatory excellence to improve the quality and understanding of regulation to enhance public protection. At its annual educational conference in the United States, CLEAR presented an award to Ahpra’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Strategy Unit (HSU), highlighting its critical role in dismantling racist behaviours and systems in healthcare.

Established in 2021, the HSU ensures that Indigenous experts lead reforms to make regulatory processes culturally safe and free from racism, and that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples are represented in decision making. The HSU draws on the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Strategy Group, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health professionals, practitioners, peak bodies and race scholars to shape its transformative work.

Led by Gomeroi woman Jayde Fuller, the HSU drives Ahpra’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and Cultural Safety Strategy 2020–2025 and its goal of eliminating racism from the health system by 2032. Ms Fuller told the conference: ‘Culturally safe healthcare for Indigenous people has been a commitment in our organisation for six years – but we've been protecting our communities for 65,000 years and regulators can learn a lot from our survival and ways of knowing, being and doing.’

‘Healthcare should not be harmful. We are taking a strategic approach to dismantling all forms of racism – systemic, institutional and interpersonal. This includes ownership and accountability by providers, practitioners and regulators for creating safe healthcare,’ Ms Fuller said.

The CLEAR award recognises the HSU’s role in driving world-first reform to embed cultural safety and the elimination of racism in healthcare into Australian legislation. The law reforms mean that if Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people receive care that is racist and unsafe, and their complaint enters the regulatory system, cultural safety must be considered. As well, registered health practitioners are required to take steps to educate themselves on cultural safety in relation to the accessibility of their services.

The award also highlights the HSU’s work to:

• include an agreed definition of cultural safety in the codes of conduct for more than 850,000 registered health practitioners
• create a culturally safe notification process for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people making a complaint
• implement cultural safety continual professional development (CPD) for all registered health practitioners.

For more information, read the news item.

Check out the latest podcasts

Ahpra’s Taking care podcast series covers a wide range of current issues in patient safety and healthcare in conversation with health experts and other people in our community. Listen and subscribe by searching for Taking care in your podcast player (for example Apple Podcasts or Spotify), or listen on our website.

The latest episode is ‘Coming to a land down under: Australia as a destination for health practitioners’. It examines the path overseas health workers must tread when wanting to work in Australia.

National Scheme news

Click on the graphic below to visit the National Scheme's newsletter page. The next issue will be out soon.

Click on the image below to visit our National Scheme newsletter page.