Ethics and Ethical Standards for Chiropractors for Chiropractors facing an Ahpra notification, complaint or allegation

The reasoning: which principles were engaged, where they conflicted, which prevailed and why, what the patient was told about the alternatives, the risks and the cost, what the effect on them was, and what you would weigh differently now — with the clause of the Chiropractic Board’s Code of conduct you fell short of named by you, before the Board names it. For a plan of care, the record of each reassessment and the reason care continued. The course gives the structure: acknowledge what happened, understand its impact, reflect — an honest evaluation of your actions, the contributing factors and the alternatives — then plan, act and evidence the change, without blame or minimisation.

Yes — before anything is written to Ahpra, the Chiropractic Board, a panel, a tribunal, your employer or a health complaints body — or, for a claim in advertising, the ACCC or a consumer-law regulator, because what is said to one may be seen by the other. Your indemnity insurer, the ACA or your association, or a lawyer should read a response before it goes. Nothing on this page is legal advice, and no course determines the outcome of a notification.

No provider is accredited by Ahpra or any National Board, and no course decides a matter. What the Board, a panel and a tribunal weigh is dated, targeted remediation with reflection that engages the standard — and this course is written for practice under the Chiropractic Board’s Code of conduct, and your reflective account is where you make the connection plain, clause by clause. Check the wording of any condition, undertaking or direction with your indemnity insurer, the ACA or your association or a lawyer before you rely on it.

After an assessment or an investigation the Chiropractic Board may take no further action, caution you, accept an undertaking or impose conditions on your registration (section 178), refer you to a panel, or refer the most serious matters to a tribunal (section 193), which can reprimand, impose conditions, fine, suspend, cancel registration and disqualify (section 196). The course describes the process — assessment, investigation, outcome — and shows why chiropractors who show insight, take responsibility and engage in remediation are treated differently from those who deflect blame or repeat the behaviour.

Not Ahpra, in either case. In New South Wales the Chiropractic Council of NSW and the Health Care Complaints Commission manage conduct, health and performance matters between them, and Ahpra does not investigate registered practitioners there. In Queensland every complaint goes first to the Office of the Health Ombudsman, which decides what it keeps and what it refers on to Ahpra and the Board. The letterhead tells you which body has your file, and the same response — the reasoning, the standard, the remediation — is what each of them reads for.

Generally no. The course’s formulation is that consent is a continuous process, not a one-time event, with three triggers for taking it again: when the treatment plan changes, when a new technique is introduced, and when the patient raises a concern. What has to be explained is the diagnosis and proposed treatment, the nature of the manual therapies, the risks and complications, the expected outcomes and limitations, and the alternatives including no treatment — the item often left out. A form signed at intake does not cover a different adjustment introduced at the twelfth visit.

Against the requirement to check patient comfort during treatment and to respect a patient’s decision to stop or modify care. What is examined is what was asked, what was heard, and what was recorded at the time; a concern of this kind is also read against clause 4.9, because the patient was in a vulnerable position. This is one of the situations where a note made at the time of a short exchange — the patient reported discomfort, treatment was stopped, the plan was revised — does more than any account written afterwards.

It can be. The course names routine treatment schedules not based on clinical need as one of the routes into over-servicing, alongside financial pressure, failure to reassess progress and a wish to retain patients. A schedule is not itself a breach; a schedule that continues without reassessment, where the record cannot show the care was still indicated, is where clause 1.3 point d and clause 6.1 engage, and a response has to answer the twelfth visit, not only the first.

Nothing prohibits them, and clause 8.11 requires honesty and transparency in financial arrangements rather than their absence. What is required is that the clinical justification and the commercial arrangement can be told apart — that the plan length follows the assessment rather than the assessment following the plan, that reassessment is real, and that the patient can stop. The course asks for a clear separation between clinical decision-making and business considerations, and a response shows it in the record.

Possibly more than one. The Guidelines for advertising a regulated health service apply under the National Law and are enforced by Ahpra and the Board, and clause 8.5 of the code sits behind them. Separately, the ACCC and state consumer-law regulators have their own powers over misleading or deceptive conduct: the ACCC can require a business to substantiate a claim, but does not resolve individual disputes. They can run at once, a finding in one does not decide the other, and what is said to one may be seen by the other — take advice before responding to either.

Yes, and the course does not prohibit it. A dual relationship is any other relationship alongside the clinical one — social, financial, business, community or family — and it is ordinary in regional and close-knit communities. The course asks you to recognise the conflict, keep the boundary, document the situation and seek guidance or supervision where needed, and it is direct that good intentions do not resolve it; clause 4.9 is the standard it is measured against. A response that shows the relationship was managed and recorded is read very differently from one that shows it was not noticed.

The Chiropractic Board’s Code of conduct, which is the shared Code of conduct made under the National Law and used by twelve National Boards — there is no separate chiropractic code, so a response cites clause numbers from that document. What is chiropractic-specific sits alongside it in the Board’s own guidelines, and the advertising guidelines apply to every registered profession. This page cites the code by clause so the reference holds.

This course is about the reasoning behind a decision and the ethical breaches a notification names; the Professionalism course is about conduct — communication, behaviour in the clinic, boundaries and social media, records, complaints and adverse events. A notification that says a decision or a relationship was unethical usually starts here; one that describes how you behaved usually starts there. The two are often taken together.

The Chiropractic Board of Australia sets its own continuing professional development registration standard, and targeted CPD on the subject of a notification is among the remediation the Board and the tribunals recognise. The certificate records the course, the 2 CPD hours and the date, which is what a CPD portfolio needs; how the hours count towards your requirement depends on the standard’s categories, so check them.

The course is 2 CPD hours, self-paced, with twelve months’ access from purchase. The certificate is issued on completion, dated, with the course title and the CPD hours, for a response, a portfolio or your CPD record.