The Medical Board of Australia’s (MBA) Professional Performance Framework has begun. Aiming to ensure competent, ethical, and safe practice, it’ll empower health professionals to deliver high quality healthcare. This article will answer your questions regarding the changes to continuing professional development (CPD) requirements for the 2023-25 triennium. Additionally, four steps will be outlined for medical professionals to follow to help meet the new rules.
Registered medical practitioners who are engaged in any form of practice are required to meet the Professional Performance Framework (PPF). A list of exclusions can be found on the Medical Board of Australia website.
The MBA’s new Registration Standards alter how medical professionals go about their CPD. These Registration Standards define requirements for AHPRA registration. In the 2023-25 triennium, the four key changes impacting practitioner CPD requirements are:
Figure 1: Comparison of 2020-23 triennium and 2023-25 triennium MBA Registration Standards for CPD activities
A major shift for medical professionals due to MBA’s requirements is the need for varied CPD activities, such as:
A learning experience can cover a combination of two or more of these activity types. This is referred to as a hybrid activity.
Figure 2: Breakdown of minimum requirements by CPD activity type and hours
The MBA has created CPD homes to improve the quality of medical professionals’ CPD activities, encouraging consistency in learning, structure and standards. An accredited CPD Home is one that is recognised by the MBA’s Australian Medical Council (AMC). The organisation may be a medical college, university, health service, professional indemnity provider, professional association or society.
If you are part of a medical college, this is your CPD Home.
Those not in a college can use independent platforms such as DoctorPortal Learning to fulfill their CPD requirements.
In your daily routine, you likely already do CPD that can be added to your hours – e.g. practice meetings, developing patient or practice resources, and multi-source feedback. Refer to your CPD home for further activities you can record as CPD.
Medical professionals must now do an annual PDP.
This will assist you in recognising your learning requirements and customising your CPD to improve patient care. Making a plan can help you consider your unique learning and development requirements based on your strengths and weaknesses. It will allow you to monitor your activities, consider what you learnt in the previous year and plan for the future.
We suggest that you start this early as it will set you up for the year.
The suggested CPD schedule below will help you meet your annual requirements. It will also help you notice activities you haven’t previously recorded as CPD.
Figure 3: Timeframe for CPD in the professional performance framework
Patient feedback is a valuable tool that can help healthcare providers, including general practices, allied health and specialist practices and
The voice of the patient is an increasingly important factor shaping the way services are delivered in the Australian healthcare
