The Physiotherapy Board of Australia (the Board) will be sharing innovations about Australian health practitioner regulation at this year’s International Network of Physical Therapy Regulatory Authorities (INPTRA) conference.

The conference, 8–9 May in Geneva, Switzerland, is being held alongside the biennual meeting of the World Confederation for Physical Therapy (WCPT) and will include a special educational meeting on physiotherapy regulation.

The mission of INPTRA is to promote and contribute to the continuous development of leading regulatory practice through education, information sharing and other collaborative activities with key stakeholders worldwide.

The conference includes educational sessions and small group discussions on issues of healthcare regulation and physiotherapy regulation. The sessions are geared towards a range of regulatory experiences, from developing a regulatory system to systems such as those in Australia, which are well developed.

Conference themes cover regulatory board governance and effectiveness, mobility, workforce, technology, ethics, standards and scope of practice and regulator innovations and issues.

Board chair Kim Gibson will be attending and believes the Australian context will be of great interest to the international physiotherapy regulatory community in attendance.

‘This conference is a platform for health regulators, policy makers, and educators to come together and draw on the knowledge and shared experiences which, in turn, contributes to quality improvement in all our work,’ Kim says. ‘We look forward to contributing our story of what regulation means for physiotherapists in Australia and sharing news of our work with the other national boards and the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency.

‘We will be highlighting the considerations necessary for physiotherapy prescribing in Australia, our work listening to health practitioners and notifiers, the challenge of building a more person-first regulatory system, how we are exploring continuous professional development strategies, our approach to engaging practitioners and developments in how we work across professions within the National Scheme,’ she says.

The Australian Physiotherapy Council will also present on the Australian experience of introducing a summative assessment to replace traditional clinical assessments for overseas-trained physiotherapists.

Go to inptra.org to find out more about regulatory issues relevant to physiotherapy and about the leaders and groups from various participating countries. Visit the Board’s website to read your registration standards, codes, guidelines and FAQS.