Health practitioners referred to the regulator when they are unwell will no longer have to undergo an independent health assessment in a bid to speed up process and better support practitioners.
The move comes as part of Ahpra’s work to improve its notifications process, with lived experience from health professionals informing the work.
Ahpra has now dealt with 13 of 33 actions identified as ways to improve how complaints against health practitioners are handled.
The action came out of a 2023 report compiled by an Ahpra commissioned an Expert Advisory Group (EAG).
Amanda Haimes, a practitioner with lived experience, said being a member of the EAG had been meaningful.
“Our work is about change; change that means future practitioners won’t have to carry the same fear, shame or pain that we did,” she said.
There were four broad areas identified for improvement: managing practitioner health concerns; being open, transparent and fostering hope; supporting practitioners throughout the process; and learning from the practitioner experience.
Of those areas the greatest progress was seen in managing practitioner health concerns.
Among the changes to the way complaints are dealt with has been the scrapping of a requirement for an independent health assessment.
“The health practitioner who is treating an unwell practitioner can often provide the information about that practitioner’s health that we require,” a progress report from Ahpra said.
“This has reduced the stress that practitioners experience when required to be assessed by a practitioner unknown to them and significantly reduces the delay (and cost) of sourcing independent assessments.”
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Such third-party assessments had added months to the length of time a notification remained open.
“This shift is significant: in 2021/22 we requested 207 independent assessments; by 2023/24 that number had reduced to 24,” the report stated.
“As a result of this and other changes, the average age of open notifications where health is the primary concern reduced by more than 74%, from 332 days to 87 days, between 1 July 2022 and 31 March 2024.”
Efforts to make the notifications process more open and transparent and maintain practitioner hope have seen an ongoing communication focus at annual registration renewal, in Board newsletters for students and practitioners, and engagement plans to address misinformation.
The hiring of regulatory advisors with conflict resolution skills was also prioritised.
These reforms have ranged from changes to the recruitment of regulatory advisors to improve negotiation and conflict resolution skills to addressing myths and misinformation about notifications.
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In terms of supporting practitioners and learning from practitioner experience, work is underway to embed cultural safety into the National Scheme and pursuing regular research to understand how to regulate more effectively and compassionately.
Ahpra said final recommendations and actions were expected to be implemented in 2026 with some of the work yet to be competed requiring further collaboration with professional associations, support services, indemnity providers, legal defence firms and education providers.
Visiting Professor in Ethics and Regulation at the University of Surrey Dr Anna Van der Gaag, also a member of the EAG, welcomed the update.
“This is good for patients and good for health practitioners. The work of understanding our data, combined with listening to those with lived experience, is having an impact,” she said.
“We need to have both as part of our ‘business as usual’ if progress is to continue in this positive direction.
“This work is not yet finished, but this report shows that Ahpra is well on the way.”
Ahpra chief executive officer Justin Untersteiner said: ‘’We want to minimise the distress that someone feels when they’re going through the notification process. Because we know that safe practice starts with practitioner wellbeing.”
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