In light of the latest Government advice, we have reviewed these pages
Please keep checking the hub for the latest advice
Our primary concern during the COVID-19 outbreak is service user safety.
We are working to ensure we don’t create any barriers to safe and effective healthcare professionals to return to practise, and we are taking steps to ensure any concerns are dealt with swiftly and effectively.
We ask for your patience at this time. Our professions are working in challenging environments and putting themselves at risk to protect service users. We must all work together during this COVID-19 pandemic.
Advice for members of the public during the COVID-19 pandemic
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Our professions, and the wider healthcare team continue to work in challenging environments.
The COVID-19 pandemic has required them to change the way they provide care. The NHS continues to carry out urgent and non-urgent services safely. It is vital anyone who thinks they need any kind of medical care comes forward and gets help.HCPC registrants are committed to their service users, and are putting themselves at risk to deliver safe and effective care during this difficult time. We expect them use their professional judgement to make reasoned decisions; taking account of our standards and guidance, along with the latest advice from the Government and NHS.
In any consultations you have with an HCPC registrant, they should be open about their approach to infection control and, when requested, explain how they are following relevant guidance.
To understand more about our expectations of registrants during COVID-19, you can read our information sheets on applying the standards.
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We ask that you follow Government and NHS advice.
Patience and understanding are vital in ensuring we support those working to take care of us; respecting them and the difficult situations they are working in.
About the COVID-19 temporary register
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In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the HCPC has worked with the UK Government to create a COVID-19 temporary register.
Our intention in doing so is to ensure there are no regulatory barriers to the following two groups practising on a temporary basis:
- Former registrants who have de-registered within the last three years.
- Third year biomedical science and clinical science students, on UK approved programmes, who have completed all their clinical practice placements.
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You can find the COVID-19 temporary register here.
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We have also decided to exclude annotations on the COVID-19 temporary register(s).
This means registrants on the COVID-19 temporary register will not be able to practice in high-risk areas, such as prescribing or podiatric surgery.
This may however be subject to change, and we will continue to monitor developments to ensure this continues to be an appropriate approach.
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We have ensured nobody appears on this list who has been subject to fitness to practise concerns in the past.
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If you have a concern about a COVID-19 temporary registrant, please email ftp@hcpc-uk.org.
There is additional guidance on raising a concern available on our website.
Our Approach to the Removal of Registrants from the Temporary Register document explains how we will assess and consider a concern we receive about someone on the temporary register.