Continuing education for cytotechnologists: the Australian experience

The development of a continuing education scheme for cytotechonologists in Australia is described. The process involved the establishment of a working party with Terms of Reference to review current practice in Australia and existing schemes in other parts of the world. The scheme developed takes th e form of a continuing education diary that provides guidelines on the vari ous forms of continuing education activity and corresponding credit points. The diary also provides for a record of activity to be kept. The scheme re quires bi-annual submission of personal activity which is logged into a nat ional database. A peer profile is provided and successful achievement is ma rked by the issue of a certificate of participation. The programme has achi eved a 57% compliance in its first year of operation.