Courses and CPD Training

Continuing Professional Development

Continuing Professional Development (CPD) is the way in which registrants continue to learn and develop throughout their careers so that they keep their skills and knowledge up to date and are able to practise safely and effectively.

CPD is a compulsory requirement of the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) registration and also of College membership. All registrants must ensure that ongoing CPD is maintained.

5 Standards of CPD

Every time you renew your HCPC registration, you are required to declare that you have, and will continue to meet their standards of CPD:

Maintain a continuous, up-to-date and accurate record of your CPD activities
Demonstrate that your CPD activities are a mixture of learning activities relevant to your current or future practice
Seek to ensure that your CPD has contributed to the quality of your practice and service delivery
Seek to ensure that your CPD benefits the service user
Present a written profile containing evidence of your CPD upon request.

Requirements of the Royal College of Podiatry

The College's requirements are as follows:

A minimum of 30 hours of CPD per year (including a mix of 15 hours clinical* and self-directed learning)
*Clinical updates are, for example, Chronic Wounds, Diabetes, Infection Control, Neurological Assessment, Pharmacology, Vascular Assessment and Basic Biomechanics

Mandatory requirements:

Basic Life Support (BLS) - Annually
Local Anaesthetic (LA) - every two years (if annotated with POM-A)
Prescription Only Medicines (POMS) - every two years (if annotated with POM-S)
Independent Prescribing (IP) - every two years (if annotated with IP)
Ultrasound - every two years (CASE accredited award)

Retaining your CPD Records

All members are required to record their CPD activities in an up-to-date record; a portfolio. If you are selected to submit a CPD profile for audit, a well-maintained CPD portfolio will prove invaluable.

Members are also expected to remain up-to-date in all areas of practice and where the update frequency for an area of practice is not specified, you should update your skills and knowledge as and when learning needs are identified, or as a refresher if you’ve not updated over the last couple of years. If selected for audit, the assessors will look to see that all integral areas of your practice have been covered at some point within that registration period.

In terms of mode of learning, a variety is always best. For example, your CPD will almost certainly involve attending courses but it is also wise to ensure that you are recording other activities such as meetings, networking, reading or research, mentoring, reading or writing articles and so much more. The key is to record a variety of activities into your portfolio with as much reflection as possible.

Members can record their learning using our Online CPD Record and access a wide range of practical and easy to use features such as uploading supporting documents, downloading part or all of your recorded activity, adding reflective notes, tracking your progress according to categories and activity types and so much more.

HCPC CPD Audits

Podiatry registrants renew their HCPC registration every two years and each time, 2.5% of registrants are selected at random to submit a profile of their CPD for audit.

Newly graduated professionals are exempt from the audit selection process at their first renewal of registration after graduation, as some time is permitted for them to adjust to practising life and undertaking CPD.

The College is here to assist members in meeting the CPD Standards, support those who are randomly selected for audit, or simply wish to find out more about CPD and the various services and tools we have in place.

College courses

Whether you're looking to refresh your knowledge or to learn something new, we deliver a wide range of short CPD courses and training that are delivered face-to-face, online or via our branches.