Welcome to the European Region of the World Confederation of Physiotherapy

Continuous Professional Development

At the 2006 General Meeting of the European Region of the WCPT was adopted a recommendation on Continuing Professional Development (CPD). This recommendation for development of programmes for CPD in physiotherapy and for future re-certification/re-registration is part of the ER-WCPT Education Policy and should be seen in the light of the Bologna Declaration and its goals as well as the following documents:

Declaration of Principle and Position Statement on Education, WCPT 2003.
Report on Post-Basic Physiotherapy Education, ER-WCPT 2000.
European Physiotherapy Benchmark Statement, ER-WCPT 2003.
Recommendation on Specialisation, ER-WCPT 2004.

The document is based on the information gathered from the Member Organisations who also are working on it and includes information on the different developments and points of view existing among the ER-WCPT members. Download the document

At the GM 2008 an updated report on CPD was adopted, and a workshop based on this report on CPD was arranged. The interest for national development of systematic CPD and portfolio is increasing.

The report recommended that an updated and revised Informative Paper should be developed including a collection of inspiration material, as an idea bank. All member organisations were requested to describe their status regarding systematic CPD

The Informative Paper was updated at the 2010 GM and and revised by the working groups on Professional Issues and Education Matters, and is a hereby presented including inspirational status description of systematic CPD from 15 Member Organisations. Download the document

It was added at the GM 2010 that ER-WCPT will continue monitoring the development of Systematic CPD including registration and re-registration during the period 2010 - 2012.

Denmark supported the adoption of the report on CPD at the 2012 GM with the following addition: The MOs should collaborate with workplaces and with education institutes/universities re development, promotion and assessment of systematic CPD. Norway also supported the adoption of the report and proposed to follow up and monitor the work in CPD within the MOs.

The working plan for the Education Matters WG 2010 – 2012 included:

Monitoring CPD - To follow up the activities on Continuous Professional Development within the Member Organisations, and continue to monitor developments in re-registration, re-certification in collaboration with the Professional Issues Working Group. The WGs thought it over and decided in collaboration with the Professional Issues WG to work towards the development of a report/statement titled “A European vision for CPD including specialisation.”

Following on the previous work carried out by the previous WGs it was decided that an update on CPD, registration, re-registration and/or specialisation be collected from the MOs with a particular interest to examine the motivations/barriers towards the implementation of CPD, and also to examine these in the context of registration and specialisation issues. This paper is reporting the outcome of a questionnaire that was circulated to MOs during 2011. The document was adopted at the 2012 GM. Download the document