Media release

16 Oct 2013

Call for expressions of interest - CPD Accreditation

The Optometry Board of Australia is inviting expressions of interest to undertake the accreditation function of continuing professional development (CPD) activities for the optometry profession.¹

The Board is committed to promoting high quality CPD for registered optometrists and is undertaking this process to provide: 

• ongoing quality CPD activities for the profession
• greater independence in the accreditation of CPD activities and/or providers, and
• an accreditation process that allows for the monitoring of quality and compliance over time.

Optometrists can fulfil their ongoing yearly CPD obligations by undertaking accredited and/or non-accredited CPD activities. Accredited CPD activities are those that have been assessed as meeting the criteria in Appendix A of the Board’s Guidelines on continuing professional development for endorsed and non-endorsed optometrists.

National Board Chair, Mr Colin Waldron, said that the Board takes its obligations to protect the public very seriously.

‘The key objective to be achieved by reviewing the assignment of CPD accreditation function is the implementation of a sustainable and stable CPD accreditation process that is independent, impartial and promotes access to accredited CPD activities for the optometry profession’, said Mr Waldron.

‘This will be of great benefit to the profession itself by ensuring ongoing monitoring and measurement of accredited CPD activities. It will also help facilitate patient access to practitioners who are better trained through quality CPD activities’, he said.
The closing date for submission of expressions of interest is 29 November 2013 and the guidance documentation is available here: CPD Accreditation Call for Expressions of Interest (130 KB,PDF), Word version (238 KB,DOC) 

For more information

• Lodge an online enquiry form
• For registration enquiries: 1300 419 495 (within Australia) +61 3 8708 9001 (overseas callers)
• For media enquiries: (03) 8708 9200

¹This is different to the accreditation function that is undertaken by ANZOC, which accredits courses on behalf of the Board.