Better health and ageing for all Australians

Media Releases and Communiques

Australian Health Ministers agree on nationally consistent approach to medical registration

Health Ministers agreed to take immediate action to progress reform of the Australian health care system in the areas of after hours GP services; aged care; chronic disease and cancer services; medical workforce planning and renal disease services

In this section:

23 April 2004

Joint Communique

Australian Health Ministers agree on nationally consistent approach to medical registration

All Australian Health Ministers, meeting in Canberra today, agreed to a nationally consistent approach to medical registration to facilitate the mobility of the Australian medical workforce, making it easier for doctors to work across state boundaries.

The approach includes a number of elements that will lead to consistency across all jurisdictions in relation to medical registration processes, categories of registration, public access to medical register information and processes for assessing maintenance of professional competence.

Health Ministers agreed that the new arrangements would benefit the medical profession, members of the public and medical boards in each state and territory.

Specifically, adoption of the new model would:

  • Simplify registration arrangements for practitioners who wish to practise in more than one jurisdiction;

  • Provide a more understandable, accessible and useful medical register through the use of nationally consistent medical registration categories; and

  • Provide clearer data on the number and distribution of doctors practising in Australia, and assist in better medical workforce planning.
Key elements of the nationally consistent approach to medical registration include:
  • The introduction of a multi-jurisdictional/national registration system under which a doctor registered in their jurisdiction of primary practice will generally also be eligible to practise in any other jurisdiction on the basis of that registration without having to lodge a separate registration application or pay a separate fee.

  • The adoption of standard and consistent medical registration categories across all jurisdictions.

  • The development of an online Australian Index of Medical Practitioners which will include all current registered practitioners in Australia.

  • The adoption of a uniform set of medical practitioner information items that will be available to the public in all jurisdictions. Public access will be made available online through the Australian Index of Medical Practitioners as well as through the medical boards in each state and territory

  • A platform for a greater role for state and territory Medical Boards in assessing maintenance of professional competency.
Ministers strongly endorsed the principle that consumers should have access to reasonable information. However, recognising the concerns raised by the Australian Medical Association around doctors' privacy and the need to balance this with consumers reasonable access to information, Ministers will reconsider, in July 2004, the extent of information about doctors that will be publicly available.

Health Ministers agreed to begin work immediately on implementing the new arrangements for nationally consistent medical registration.

Media contact: Kay McNiece, Media Adviser, AHMC Secretariat 0412 132 585