The Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care (the Commission) administers the National General Practice Accreditation (NGPA) Scheme.
The NGPA Scheme supports the consistent assessment of Australian general practices against the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) Standards for general practices and the RACGP Standards for point-of-care testing.
Standardised Repeat Assessments
From 1 January 2024 the Commission will standardise requirements for repeat assessments for general practices under the NGPA Scheme.
General practices assessed under the NGPA Scheme with 20% or more mandatory indicators rated ‘not met’ following the initial assessment will fall under the new requirements published in Advisory GP23/03: Standardised repeat assessment of general practices.
There are 116 mandatory indicators under the (RACGP) Standards for general practices, this would mean if 23 or more mandatory indicators are ‘not met’, a standardised repeat assessment would be conducted 6 months after the completion of the accreditation cycle.
Advisories updated in 2023
Advisory GP18/04: Notification of Significant Risk
This advisory describes the requirements where an assessor is on site and identifies one or more significant risk(s).
Advisory GP23/02: Requests for extensions and appeals
This advisory outlines the requirements for accrediting agencies and general practices requests for extensions and appeals under the NGPA Scheme.
Approved accrediting agencies
Under the NGPA Scheme, the Commission approves and monitors the performance of accrediting agencies. The following organisations are approved to assess general practices to the RACGP Standards for general practices and the RACGP Standards for point-of-care testing.
- Australian Council on Healthcare Standards
- AGPAL Group of Companies
- Global-Mark Pty Ltd
- Quality Practice Accreditation Pty Ltd
Post Assessment Survey
The Commission is seeking feedback from general practices to ensure accrediting agencies comply with the requirements of the NGPA scheme and to gain insight into your experience of the assessment process.
If your practice has completed the accreditation assessment after 1 July 2023 it would be appreciated if you could complete this 5 – 10-minute survey.
The information collected is used to improve the effectiveness of the NGPA scheme. All information is de-identified and is not attributed to an individual or a general practice.
More information
Visit safetyandquality.gov.au/NGPA-Scheme or email advicecentre@safetyandquality.gov.au