Australia’s landmark reform regarding designated registered nurse prescribers represents a transformative step in advancing healthcare equity and strengthening the nursing workforce.
With the new Registration Standard, Endorsement for Scheduled Medicines – Designated Nurse Prescriber, taking effect in September 2025, steps are well and truly underway to realising this important reform.
When regulatory and legislative changes are made to enable the authorising environment here in Victoria – expected to be around October 2026 – these new roles will better support integrated models of care, reduce delays and alleviate pressure on overstretched medical services, benefiting medical practitioners, patients and communities.
Success depends, however, on timely amendments to the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Regulations 2017 and the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act (1981) followed by robust implementation of the standard, workforce readiness and sustained collaboration across professions and health sectors.
Find out more in the latest implementation update from the Department of Health
Interested in becoming an RN prescriber?
Registered nurses interested in becoming designated RN prescribers will need endorsement from the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia. To get endorsed, RNs must hold current general registration, have the equivalent of three years’ full-time clinical experience, and complete a board-approved postgraduate qualification or equivalent units of study in RN prescribing. Several universities have already begun offering approved courses.
Candidates will also be required to complete a minimum six-month structured clinical mentorship with either a doctor or a nurse practitioner, and to work within a defined governance framework, and adhere to relevant legislation.
Find out more
Marie Gerdtz will be presenting on the topic at the upcoming Australian Nurses & Midwives Conference. Marie is the Dean of the School of Nursing and Midwifery at La Trobe University, and has extensive experience in clinical leadership, workforce development, and health policy reform. She has a particular interest in advancing nursing education and practice to address healthcare equity and system sustainability.
‘RN prescribing is important because it will allow nurses to work to their full scope of practice,’ she says. ‘It’s also important for individuals who need timely access to medicines – for there to be somebody who can administer the medicine, and also reissue it, prescribe it.’
Nurses are ideally placed for this role, Marie says, because they ‘are very much in direct contact with communities and individuals,’ which means these communities and individuals ‘don’t have to wait for a GP to get a script. If we have a nurse prescriber, they can confidently gain access to those medicines.’
This is especially important in rural and regional communities, and for nurses delivering palliative care, she says. ‘It’s an equity issue, with the aim of offering better access and quality use of medicines. There’s a real imperative to make sure this is scaled properly and that it’s evaluated properly against the primary need. And the primary need is where access doesn’t exist.’
