National Occupational Respiratory Disease Registry

This notice is provided to you on behalf of the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care. Please read this important message, familiarise yourself with the new mandatory reporting requirements, and print a copy of the Physician Factsheet for your staff noticeboard, as well as the flyer for how to access your account. 

Commencement

The National Occupational Respiratory Disease Registry (National Registry) will begin on Wednesday, 22 May 2024.

The National Registry

The National Registry will capture and share data on the incidence of occupational respiratory diseases, causative exposures and respiratory health data. The National Registry will assist in:

• detecting new and emerging threats to worker’s respiratory health
• targeting and monitoring the effectiveness of interventions and prevention strategies in reducing worker exposure to respiratory disease-causing agents.

From 22 May 2024, it will be mandatory for all prescribed medical practitioners in Australia to notify diagnoses of silicosis to the National Registry.

A prescribed medical practitioner is a medical practitioner registered under the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law in the specialties of:

a)     occupational and environmental medicine, or

b)     respiratory and sleep medicine.

They can also choose to report other occupational respiratory diseases to the National Registry, with patient consent. All notifications of occupational respiratory diseases will need to be submitted to the Physician Portal. The Physician Portal has been designed to minimise time spent entering information for the physician. 

What is next?

• further updates to ensure they are aware of their obligations and will know what information to notify, and when
• further information and access to the Physician Portal, so they can register to the portal and arrange one or more agents to act on their behalf if they choose
• user guides and documents to support use of the portal. 

Find out more

Further updates about the National Registry will be made available from the Department’s website. If you have an enquiry, please email the Department directly.