Last week, AAPi attended the Ahpra symposium regarding practitioner well-being during the notifications process. We thank members for sharing their personal stories over the previous few weeks, as the themes identified aligned with the concerns of other health professionals.
AAPi had the opportunity to provide specific recommendations to Ahpra and the Department for improving these processes. Recommendations included:
- Improved communication.
- Reduced delays.
- Processes for excluding vexatious or retaliatory/vengeful complaints.
- Better education is needed for all health professionals regarding the key areas where health practitioners receive complaints, and how to prevent these.
- Clarifying mandatory reporting and the management of practitioners who have health conditions or disabilities.
- There is an urgent need for supports to be put in place for those going through the notification and complaint process.
It is AAPi's position that it is important that people are encouraged to seek help and feel like they can do that without having complaints made about them or being classified as an impaired practitioner. It's likely that if someone is seeking treatment, this is a protective factor for their clients and not something that needs to be reported and causes more distress.
This review process was triggered by a recent review of the notifications process and research published on the impact of notifications on registered health practitioners.
Through this research, three themes were found that caused distress to practitioners through the notification process:
- The insult of the complaint. Practitioners experienced identity decay, self-doubt, injustice, loss of hope, threat to self-perception, and damage to their professional identity simply through receiving a complaint even if it is unsubstantiated.
- Communication issues with Ahpra. There was a lack of helpful information, unclear timelines, lengthy delays, no regular updates, and no idea of the likely outcome of complaints, and this caused immense distress for practitioners.
- External factors and pre-existing conditions. Practitioners who had mental ill health, substance use, criminal misconduct, were isolated (such as in rural and remote regions), had limited personal support, were overseas trained and had anxiety about their visa status, and those who had experienced evaporation of support from their colleagues due to their complaints struggled a lot more with the complaints process.
Protective factors that assist practitioners through the complaints process were having personal and professional support, positive encounters with Ahpra staff, mentoring, guidance, tailored help, having their questions answered, phone check-ins, and support from Ahpra staff or someone external to the agency.
AAPi will evaluate what further supports we can put into place to increase the support we provide to our members navigating complaints. AAPi currently provides:
We see many opportunities for AAPi as a member association to do more, and positively impact the well-being of psychologists going through the complaints process. You can find links to support agencies here if you are going through a notification and need personal support outside of AAPi.
AAPi will be working closely with Ahpra and other peak bodies to assist in changing these processes so that on those occasions where regulation is needed, it protects the public without causing unnecessary distress to practitioners.
AAPi also had the opportunity to attend 2 of the Scope of Practice Review meetings in Melbourne and Brisbane. There is a vast amount of evidence that there are significant barriers in the current system that mean that health practitioners are not able to work to their full scope of practice, and there are many benefits to enabling them to be able to do so.
Review recommendations so far include many initiatives that will directly impact psychology, such as reviewing and streamlining endorsement arrangements, allowing direct referrals between health practitioners without the need to triage through GPs, equalising payment for services that are the same regardless of the provider type, encouraging multidisciplinary care teams, more recognition for qualifications including recognised prior learning, micro-credentialing and facilitating secure digital communication between healthcare providers.
AAPi was impressed by the interactive process undertaken during this workshop that allowed us to provide significant opinions and feedback to the research team.
So far this year, there have been significant indicators that the tide is turning for our profession. After years of hard work to get here, it is so satisfying to see the pieces falling into place.