Late career doctors - Supporting safe practice

The Board values the contribution of late career doctors and is developing an approach that will help keep them in safe practice. The Board is proposing regular health checks for doctors aged over 70 years because the risk of poor performance increases with age.

There is strong evidence that there is a decline in performance and patient outcomes with increasing practitioner age, even when the practitioner is highly experienced.

The Board will be consulting widely with the profession and the community about options to support late career doctors to practice safely, including through regular health checks.

The evidence about increasing risk with age is described in the Expert Advisory Group Final report.