What Is an Audit?

Welcome to the CPD Guide! This article is the sixth installation of a series of articles that explain every element of CPD including the CPD period, general CPD requirements, and audits.

What is a CPD audit?

A CPD audit is an assessment of your compliance with the relevant mandatory registration standards.

According to Ahpra:

Why do CPD audits exist?

Healthcare practice is constantly evolving. There are ever-changing risks that jeopardise the care being provided by health practitioners: these risks can be due to technological improvements, methods of care, medication development, cultural shifts and many other factors.

As such, it is essential to conduct audits that determine and evaluate health practitioners' compliance with their CPD requirements. It is a necessary process to ensure health practitioners are committed to updating, developing, maintaining and improving their professional performance – as well as their knowledge and skills – in order to provide sufficient patient care and desired outcomes.

Source: Ahpra’s Annual Report 2021/22

Who gets audited?

Audits are performed at random regardless of the registration board a health practitioner is registered under.

According to Ahpra’s Annual Report 2021/22, Ahpra completed 8,155 audits over the 2021/2022 registration period. 0.23% of healthcare practitioners who were audited were non-compliant, while 98.26% of practitioners were in full compliance with their mandatory registration standard.

How can you make sure you’re ready for an audit?

You must be able to demonstrate you have met your Board’s CPD requirements for the registration period including:

• The minimum amount of CPD required.
• Your learning plan for the registration period that is being audited.
• All of the relevant learning activities that you completed during that registration period.
• Written reflections on each of the learning activities documented, which highlight how each activity related to a learning need.
• Evidence of completion for each learning activity, such as certificates or notes.

Maintaining proof of your compliance with the registration standards is best managed via a CPD portfolio. Ausmed’s portfolio is a great way to manage, document and reflect on your CPD as well as relate learning to your relevant competency standards.

With Ausmed, you can also create CPD reports at the touch of a button. These are incredibly helpful if you’re audited, and you need to have a certifiable list of your CPD activities as fast as possible.

It is important to note that it is the Board’s discretion what registration standard(s) is audited. A practitioner’s compliance with a number of registration standards may concurrently occur.

What next?

Once you’ve read this article on audits, return to the CPD Guide to find out more about the required professional development. We recommend reading ‘The difference between mandatory training and CPD' next.