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Specialising in SEO for Allied Health Professionals

Help with AHPRA Compliance

In Australia, strict regulations apply to the way that registered health care professionals can promote their services – and that includes website content.

This means that you could find yourself in hot water, even when you thought you’d fulfilled your obligations under the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) advertising guidelines.

For example – are you using testimonials on your website or Facebook? If so, you have probably broken the rules*!

If you are found to be in breach of the AHPRA Guidelines, it is a criminal offence and at time of writing, carries a fine of up to $5 000 (individual) or $10 000 (bodies corporate).

As a registered health practitioner, YOU are the one that is liable, not your staff or a contractor. So you will want to be very sure that when you delegate or outsource marketing tasks such as social media, copywriting, or SEO to somebody else, that they have a comprehensive knowledge of these guidelines.

We’ve helped many clients to satisfy AHPRA requirements, even after they’ve received a formal notice, including:

  • Chinese Medicine Practitioners (acupuncturists)
  • Chiropractors
  • Dentists
  • Medical Practitioners
  • Optometrists
  • Osteopaths
  • Physiotherapists
  • Podiatrists
  • Psychologists.

Although the guidelines are freely available on the AHPRA website, it is a lot of information to digest.

AHPRA tends to assume that if you are smart enough to be a health professional, you are smart enough to read and abide by the advertising guidelines. While this may be true, it does take a lot of time – and time is at a premium for busy health professionals and business owners.

The first you may know that you have (unwittingly) committed a breach, is when you receive an official letter from AHPRA. If this has happened to you, the fines and penalties mentioned can be quite alarming !

It can also be extremely confusing as you may not even realise the exact changes required to comply with section 133 of the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law. You may be advised to consult your professional association, lawyer, or insurer, if you aren’t confident about remedying the problem yourself.

However, there is a better, more affordable option if you have fallen foul of the AHPRA guidelines, or are just concerned about whether your website content complies.

*But not always, which is why you need to find somebody who can help you clarify the difference.

Help with AHPRA Compliance

With over 10 years’ experience working with allied health practices providing SEO and  health care copywriting, we are fully conversant with the AHPRA guidelines.

Although we are not legal professionals, we have been able to resolve the issue to AHPRA’s satisfaction for a number of health care practitioners.

We can review the copy on your website, make recommendations, and implement changes to help you fulfil the requirements, and ease your distress.

And if you prefer, we have a legal professional we can call on to review the updated copy. This is after we’ve done the hard yards of identifying problem areas and editing them in accordance with AHPRA’s guidelines, to help keep the overall fee more affordable. 

If you are having AHPRA headaches, don’t take two paracetamol – get in touch with us today!

“AHPRA reviewed the changes and were happy with it all …”