A working reference for general practitioners, practice managers and registrars on CPD requirements, PDSA cycles, the PIP QI incentive, RACGP standards and the data, software and team practices that turn quality improvement into documented CPD.
Last reviewed: July 2026. Editorial and review process: about this site. Each topic also has its own page under the CPD and QI answers hub. Sources cited at the end.
You must complete 50 hours of CPD each calendar year, with at least 12.5 hours in Educational Activities, at least 5 hours in Reviewing Performance, at least 5 hours in Measuring Outcomes, and the remaining 12.5 hours free choice across any category. You must also hold an annual Professional Development Plan and an end-of-year self assessment and reflection.
The Medical Board of Australia (MBA) Registration standard: continuing professional development took effect on 1 January 2023 and moved Australia from a triennium model to an annual model. RACGP and ACRRM run their own CPD programs that meet the MBA standard.
No. The 2023 MBA standard made CPD annual, although the colleges still group calendar years into triennia for some internal reporting. RACGP's current triennium runs 2026 to 2028, but each calendar year is the unit of compliance.
You record 50 hours per year across Educational Activities, Reviewing Performance and Measuring Outcomes, with a Professional Development Plan at the start of the year and a reflection at year end. Each year you must include at least one CPD activity that addresses each of the RACGP program-level requirements: culturally safe practice, health inequities, and professionalism and ethical practice. A CPR course is required once per triennium.
ACRRM aligns with the same 50-hour annual standard but uses its own activity types and emphasises rural and remote practice. ACRRM members log through the ACRRM portal and should confirm category mapping with their college if they also work in non-rural settings.
Yes. The MBA CPD Registration standard applies to all registered medical practitioners in Australia, with limited exemptions (for example, recent retirees returning to practice under certain conditions, or practitioners in specific leave categories). VR status does not change the obligation; it only changes which college CPD home you use.
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A CPD home is an organisation accredited by the Australian Medical Council to provide a CPD program that meets the MBA standard. From 2024 onwards, every doctor needs a CPD home, and you record all your activities through that home's portal.
The two large general practice providers are RACGP and ACRRM. Several other specialty colleges and a small number of non-college providers are also accredited. The MBA publishes the current list.
Costs vary. RACGP fellowship includes CPD home access; non-fellows pay a separate fee. ACRRM membership includes CPD. Non-college homes are paid services and prices differ. Confirm current fees with the home you are considering.
Not mid-year, or only with a transition plan agreed by both homes. Most homes expect a full calendar year. If you change fellowship or college membership, plan the switch at year end.
It hosts your annual Professional Development Plan, your activity log, your reflection, your evidence storage and your audit response. The home also reports your compliance to the MBA on request.
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EA covers activities that expand your knowledge, skills or attitudes. Reading journals, attending lectures, completing online modules, podcasts and conferences are typical EA. The 2026 minimum is 12.5 hours.
RP covers activities where you review your work against an external standard, peer review or feedback. Multisource feedback, peer review of clinical notes, supervisor reports and significant event analyses all count as RP. The 2026 minimum is 5 hours.
MO covers activities where you measure the outcomes of your work using your own data. PDSA cycles, clinical audits, benchmarking against guidelines and patient outcome reviews all count as MO. The 2026 minimum is 5 hours.
Yes. RACGP calls these hybrid activities. A PDSA cycle that includes a literature review (EA), a peer review of your approach (RP) and measurement against an aim (MO) can be claimed across all three. The CPD home then splits the hours against each category.
Your CPD home's activity catalogue maps common activity types to categories. If an activity is not in the catalogue, you propose the category mapping and your home approves it.
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Quality improvement (QI) is any structured, iterative change to clinical or practice systems that you measure against an aim. PDSA cycles, clinical audits, significant event analyses, population health reviews, prescribing pattern reviews and care plan reviews are all QI.
An audit compares practice against a standard at a point in time. A QI activity is iterative: you test a change, measure the result, and adjust. Most clinical audits become QI when you act on the finding and re-measure.
Yes. The two programs are separate (CPD is the MBA obligation; PIP QI is the Practice Incentives Program payment), but the same QI work can satisfy both. A PDSA on HbA1c review frequency, for example, generates CPD hours for the GP and contributes to the practice's PIP QI data submission.
Pick one measurable problem in your patient population, write a specific aim, define one change and run a short measurement cycle (one to four weeks is the norm). The activity is feasible if one GP and a practice manager can run it; it is meaningful if the result changes care for an identifiable patient group.
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A PDSA (Plan-Do-Study-Act) cycle is a structured four-step test of change. You plan the change and prediction, do it on a small scale, study the data against your prediction, and act on what you learned (adopt, adapt or abandon). The cycle then repeats with the next change.
Pick a problem from your data (for example, BMI recording rates below PHN benchmark). Write a specific aim. Agree one change to test. Run the change for a defined period (often one week per quarter). Measure the result. Discuss at a brief team meeting. Decide what to embed. Document each step.
Hours reflect actual time spent. A single small PDSA (one GP, one week, one change) commonly generates 2 to 4 hours. A practice-wide PDSA with planning, two measurement weeks, team meeting and embedded change can reach 6 to 9 hours. RACGP classifies PDSA as Measuring Outcomes; with reflection on practice change it can be hybridised into RP and EA.
Yes, and this is the model PDSA methodology was designed for. Several rapid cycles of small changes align with continuous improvement better than a single annual audit. Document each cycle separately.
No. A blank page with the four headings (Plan, Do, Study, Act) is enough. Templates help with consistency across a practice team but are not required for CPD evidence.
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The Model for Improvement (developed by Associates in Process Improvement and popularised by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement) pairs PDSA cycles with three framing questions: what are we trying to accomplish, how will we know that a change is an improvement, and what change can we make that will result in improvement. The model is the standard scaffold taught in RACGP and ACRRM QI training.
A run chart plots your measure over time, with a median line and rule-based signals for non-random change. Run charts are not required for a PDSA cycle, but they make the Study stage much stronger. Most QI training programs (including IHI and many PHN-delivered courses) include run chart basics.
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The Practice Incentives Program Quality Improvement (PIP QI) Incentive pays eligible general practices for participating in continuous quality improvement in partnership with their local Primary Health Network (PHN). It commenced on 1 August 2019.
Eligible practices can receive a maximum payment of $12,500 per quarter, calculated at $5.00 per Standardised Whole Patient Equivalent (SWPE) per year. Payment requires at least one quarterly data submission in the relevant quarter.
The 10 quality improvement measures (QIMs) are the practice's share of regular patients with:
There are no prescribed targets. Practices choose where to focus.
PIP QI requires the practice to commit to continuous QI, not to specific cycles. PDSA cycles are one of several ways to meet the commitment. Many practices structure their PDSA work around one or more of the 10 measures.
The PIP Eligible Data Set is the de-identified practice data the practice submits quarterly to its PHN against the 10 measures. Submission is via compliant data extraction software (most commonly PenCS Cat4 or POLAR, depending on PHN arrangements).
The data is de-identified before it leaves the practice. The Department of Health treats the data sharing as covered by the practice's existing clinical relationship. Patients who object can request their data be excluded from extraction; practices should document a process for this.
You fail the eligibility requirement for that quarter's payment. Reinstating the payment requires the next successful quarterly submission.
Quarterly, through Services Australia, based on the practice's PIP registration and SWPE. The payment is paid to the practice, not to individual GPs.
Yes. PIP QI sits alongside the other Practice Incentives Program payments (for example, teaching, eHealth, after-hours). The eligibility criteria for each are separate.
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The RACGP standards for general practices (5th edition) include a Quality Improvement criterion, Criterion QI1.1, with four indicators. The practice must have at least one team member with primary responsibility for leading its quality improvement systems (A), share information internally about quality improvement and patient safety (B), seek feedback from the team about those systems (C), and be able to describe areas of the practice it has improved in the past three years (D). Only the fourth indicator is about improvement activity itself; the other three are about how the practice organises quality improvement. Practices must demonstrate all four to gain or retain accreditation.
The two are separate but compatible. Accreditation is a practice-level assessment against the standards. CPD is an individual professional obligation. A completed PDSA cycle is evidence for Criterion QI1.1 indicator D and generates CPD hours for each GP who took part. It does not on its own satisfy indicators A, B and C, which need a named quality improvement lead with the role documented, a record that the team shares information about quality improvement, and a record of team feedback about the system.
Often yes, including cold chain monitoring, infection control audits and health record audits, where the GP can show individual engagement and reflection. Check the activity with your CPD home for category mapping.
Yes, where the CPD activity addresses a quality or safety gap relevant to a standard criterion. Your CPD home's record is useful accreditation evidence.
The Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care approves four accrediting agencies for general practice under the National General Practice Accreditation (NGPA) Scheme: AGPAL, Quality Practice Accreditation (formerly GPA Accreditation Plus), the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards (ACHS), and Global-Mark. Some PHNs run or support accreditation readiness programs. The choice of accreditation body is the practice's.
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Yes, if you actively participated in the plan, do, study and act phases, and you can document your specific role and reflection. A group summary is not enough on your own. You need an individual record.
Only if each GP claiming hours actively participated in the relevant stages. Passive awareness from a staff meeting does not qualify. Genuine engagement in data review, decision making or implementation is required.
Use a master project document that describes the overall activity, then add individual reflection notes for each participating GP covering your specific role, what you learned, and how it changed your practice. Keep meeting minutes, tally sheets or other participation evidence. Each GP logs hours in their own CPD portfolio.
Yes, if your contribution during the active parts of the cycle was substantive. A GP on parental leave for the full cycle cannot claim hours for an activity they did not participate in. A GP on leave for one of three measurement weeks can claim a pro-rata share.
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Keep the plan (aim, measure, prediction, change), the data (baseline and post-change), the analysis (what you learned), the action (adopt, adapt or abandon), and a short reflection on what you would do differently. For a practice-wide cycle, also keep the team meeting minutes and the data entry or protocol changes that came out of the cycle.
No, but it must be substantive enough to show genuine learning. A short paragraph that addresses what worked, what did not, what you would change next time, and how it changed your practice is more defensible than a long but generic summary.
PDSA methodology treats a null or negative result as a valid learning outcome. Document the result, your analysis of why the change did not work and your next planned change. Failed cycles are often the most defensible evidence of genuine QI practice at audit.
Three years from the end of the relevant CPD year, in line with the MBA standard. Your CPD home stores the structured record; you are responsible for keeping the underlying evidence (data extracts, tally sheets, minutes) for the same period.
Yes. Both the MBA and individual CPD homes conduct random audits. For QI activities specifically, expect to be asked to show your plan, your data, your reflection, and how the activity connects to your practice.
Practices can be audited by Services Australia on their PIP claims, including PIP QI. The audit looks at eligibility and data submission, not the specific QI cycle content.
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Common options: clinical software audit and search functions (Best Practice, Medical Director, Zedmed, MedTech), data extraction tools (PenCS Cat4, POLAR, GRHANITE), patient surveys, manual chart review and practice management system reports (wait times, DNA rates, billing patterns).
PenCS Cat4 is a data extraction and analysis tool widely licensed to Australian general practices through PHN partnerships. It generates the 10 PIP QI measures and supports a range of other clinical audits. Availability is via your PHN.
POLAR is a data extraction and analysis tool, also widely licensed to Australian practices through PHN partnerships. POLAR and PenCS Cat4 are the two dominant tools. PHN choice of tool varies by region.
Both extract de-identified data from clinical software, both produce the PIP QI measures, both support additional QI audits. The user interface, supported clinical software and specific audit options differ. PHN licensing arrangements also differ. For most QI purposes, the two are interchangeable.
Limited. The built-in search and audit functions in Best Practice, Medical Director, Zedmed and MedTech cover many QI activities. The CAT4 and POLAR tools add automation and benchmarking. Some PHNs offer free training on the built-in software functions.
Yes, if the learning is structured. Training in PenCS or POLAR counts as Educational Activities. The QI activity that follows the training can then count as RP and MO.
Extract only the fields you need. Remove names, addresses, full dates of birth, Medicare numbers and any other direct identifiers. Use age in years or age band rather than date of birth. Retain the identifier-to-record mapping only on a secure local system if re-identification is required for follow-up, and limit access to clinical staff.
De-identify to the standard required by your local research ethics committee or low-risk review pathway. The PHN's data sharing agreement may also restrict secondary use. Confirm before publishing.
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QI activities commonly open pathways for GP Chronic Condition Management Plans, Team Care Arrangements, health assessments, asthma and diabetes cycle of care items, and mental health treatment plans. The QI itself does not bill MBS; it identifies patients who meet the relevant item descriptors.
A practice-wide PDSA on BMI recording or HbA1c review frequency surfaces patients eligible for a GP Chronic Condition Management Plan. The QI delivers the population view; the GPMP delivers the revenue and clinical value per patient.
Indirectly, yes. Most QI work that increases identification of patients with chronic conditions, missed screening or suboptimal management increases billable MBS activity over the following year. The PIP QI incentive is a direct revenue line for the practice.
TCAs require a chronic condition and a multidisciplinary care plan involving at least two other providers. A QI activity that maps patients with poorly controlled type 2 diabetes, for example, identifies both the eligible patients and the allied health referral opportunities.
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Yes. Practices serving Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander patients can run QI activities around health assessment uptake (item 715), chronic disease management, and culturally safe care. PIP QI measure 9 (cervical screening) and measure 1 (HbA1c) are commonly used as starting points.
The RACGP program-level requirements (culturally safe practice, health inequities, professionalism and ethical practice) are an annual CPD obligation. A QI activity that addresses health inequities in your patient population can count toward both the program-level requirement and the QI category.
The QI methodology itself is the same; the topic, the patient engagement and the outcomes need to be culturally informed. For practices with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander patients, this often means co-designing the activity with the patients, the ACCHO, or the community-controlled health sector.
Audit the data you use. If your smoking status recording is high but your cervical screening rate is low for a defined patient group, the QI activity is the gap, not the recording rate. The activity should be designed with the affected patient group, not just for them.
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Registrars on an RACGP or ACRRM training program (AGPT, FSP, RVTS, or the independent pathway) meet their annual CPD requirements through the training program for any year they participate for at least one semester. They do not need a separate CPD home during training.
Registrars are clinical team members and can participate in any QI activity the practice runs. Their contribution counts toward the training program's learning requirements, not separately toward CPD. Documenting their role helps both the registrar's training record and the practice's audit evidence.
Yes. New RACGP Fellows whose Fellowship date falls between January and June receive 30 hours of credit (15 EA, 7.5 RP, 7.5 MO) and complete modified requirements for the rest of the year. New Fellows with a July or later date receive a full block credit for the remainder of that year.
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No, in most cases, if the data is de-identified and used within the practice for QI purposes. The Privacy Act 1988 includes a quality assurance and evaluation exemption that covers most in-practice QI work. The exemption has specific conditions, and your practice's privacy policy should describe how QI data is handled.
The exemption is in section 95 (for HREC-approved QI) and section 95A (for activities that do not need full HREC review). Most in-practice QI fits the latter, where the activity is conducted by a health service provider for the purpose of evaluating or improving safety or quality of healthcare.
Note in your plan the legal basis (de-identified data, in-practice use, quality improvement purpose), the data fields, the data storage, the access controls, and any patient opt-out requests received. This documentation is what you rely on at audit.
Limit identifiers to what is needed for the activity. If you need to re-contact patients, retain a separate re-identification key on a secure local system. If the activity is fully anonymous, identifiers are unnecessary.
When the activity aims to generate generalisable knowledge, is published externally, or is conducted by someone outside the treating team, it shifts from QI to research. Research requires ethics review. Most practice-internal QI does not.
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Keep it to 20 to 30 minutes. Share the data (baseline, post-change, the gap). Highlight one or two specific findings. Ask what worked, what got in the way, what to change. Agree the next cycle or embed the change. Document the meeting and circulate the agreed actions.
The practice manager coordinates the data extraction, organises the team meeting, files the evidence and tracks actions. The GP provides clinical leadership and the patient-facing change. Nurses, receptionists and allied health staff provide operational perspective.
Pick a problem they care about (workload, billing gaps, missed results, recall failures) and run one small cycle. Show the result. The data is the persuader, not the method.
At minimum, a clinical lead (GP), a coordinator (practice manager or senior nurse), and a data lead (whoever runs the extraction tool). Add a consumer representative for activities that affect patient experience. For training practices, the registrar is a useful team member.
Use a standing agenda: data review, findings, decisions, next cycle, individual actions. Time-box each section. End with one written decision and one named owner.
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Document the change in a protocol, train the team, audit at one month and three months, and report back at a team meeting. If the change holds, embed it in the practice's standing operating procedure.
Through your PHN, your local GP peer group, the RACGP or ACRRM QI showcase, or a published case study. Sharing benefits the spread of evidence-based change and contributes to your CPD as a Reviewing Performance activity.
Adoption is one team taking up the same change. Spread needs a network (PHN, training program, peer group) and a mechanism (template, training session, written protocol) for the change to travel.
Schedule the next cycle before the current one ends. Rotate the clinical lead. Link the activity to a recurring team meeting. Celebrate a successful change publicly.
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Running the activity but failing to document the reflection or the practice change. Colleges are increasingly asking for evidence of genuine learning, not just activity completion. A cycle with no documented reflection is incomplete CPD.
No, or with caution. The MBA standard requires CPD to be completed within the relevant CPD year. A cycle that genuinely happened in 2025 but was only documented in 2026 is a hard case to defend at audit. Where unavoidable, keep evidence of contemporaneous notes (tally sheets, meeting minutes, data extracts from the original period) to support the late reflection.
Pick topics relevant to your actual patient population. Allow time between cycles to genuinely test change. Be honest in documentation, including failures. Link each activity to a known practice gap, not to a convenient topic.
The CPD home or the MBA can require you to complete additional CPD, can record non-compliance against your registration or can refer the matter to the MBA for further action. Thorough reflection and contemporaneous evidence are the protection.
Yes, with individual documentation. Each GP who participated logs their hours separately with their own reflection on their specific role and learning.
CPD hours are the individual's time; PIP QI is the practice's data submission and QI commitment. They are different programs and you can count both. The risk of double-counting arises only if you claim the same CPD hours against two different CPD activities for the same doctor, which your CPD home's portal will prevent.
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The direction is toward more demonstrable practice change, not just activity completion. AI-supported audit tools are making data extraction and benchmarking easier. Expect the program-level requirements (cultural safety, health inequities, professionalism) to expand in scope, and expect closer integration between CPD, PIP QI, and accreditation evidence.
The MBA's 2023 Registration standard: continuing professional development is the most recent reset. The signal from the MBA and Ahpra is that the annual model, the program-level requirements, and the CPD home framework are stable. Future changes will come in the program-level requirements and in the audit intensity, not in the fundamental 50-hour structure.
The MBS Continuous Review is ongoing. Recent changes (Chronic Condition Management Plan, GP Mental Health Treatment Plan review) have shifted the items relevant to chronic disease management. For QI purposes, track the MBS changes most relevant to your patient population; that is where new audit opportunities arise.
No. The trend is toward more meaningful engagement with QI, which, if you are already doing genuine reflective practice, makes compliance easier over time. Stay informed through the RACGP and ACRRM newsletters rather than through anxiety.
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Your CPD home's resource library, your local PHN, the RACGP QI and CPD resources, and the ACRRM PDP resources. Accreditation bodies (AGPAL, Quality Practice Accreditation) also publish templates that align with the standards.
The Medius Global library includes worked PDSA guides for BMI recording and weight management, recall system improvement, and chronic disease management activities. Each guide includes the plan, the data, the worked example, the practice-level findings, and the change-embed template.
Use the four headings: Plan (aim, measure, prediction, change), Do (what you did, when, who was involved, what surprised you), Study (the data, what worked, what did not, why), Act (what to embed, what the next cycle will be, who owns the change). Add a short reflection covering your specific role and learning.
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The 10 PIP QI measures, the 50-hour annual CPD standard, and the RACGP program-level requirements are current as at the last reviewed date at the top of this page. Verify against your college and the Department of Health before relying on the figures for compliance.
Disclaimer: CPD requirements, hour allocations and category structures are set by the MBA, RACGP and ACRRM. The PIP QI measures and payment rates are set by the Department of Health and Aged Care and Services Australia. Always verify current requirements directly with the relevant body before finalising your CPD plan. This FAQ is general guidance and does not replace official college or government resources.