What is regulation?

It means setting standards and requirements that physician associates must meet to be registered with Te Kaunihera Rata o Aotearoa | the Medical Council of New Zealand (the Council), and to practise as PAs in Aotearoa New Zealand.

What are physician associates?

PAs are trained health professionals who work under the supervision of a medical doctor to provide healthcare to patients. While PAs work closely with doctors and nurses, they are a separate profession.

The titles ‘physician associate’ and ‘physician assistant’ are both used internationally to describe the same profession. To avoid confusion, we will use the abbreviation of ‘PA’ in the information below.

Why is MCNZ regulating physician associates?

In April 2025, the Minister of Health announced that PAs would be regulated in Aotearoa New Zealand, and that the Council would be the regulator of PAs. This responsibility is now set in legislation.

How will MCNZ regulate physician associates?

The Council’s role is to protect the public by ensuring that its registrants are qualified and competent to be registered, and to set standards for good practice. We expect PAs to meet these standards, so that patients can be confident they are receiving safe healthcare. We need your input to help us get the regulation right – please see the proposals below. 

Go to:

➤    What PAs can do – their scopes of practice
➤    Qualifications and registration pathways – proposed 
➤    How PAs will be supervised – proposed framework
➤    Cultural safety requirements
➤    Deciding the right title for PA scopes of practice  

How to have your say

We have prepared a paper explaining in detail how we propose to regulate PAs. You can tell us your thoughts by using the survey questionnaire at the link below.

➤   Online survey questionnaire

Next steps

We will look at all consultation feedback in early 2026 to inform final decisions to ensure we are regulating PAs in the right way. The Council plans to start regulating PAs later in 2026.  

In the meantime, we will work on:

•    recertification (ongoing professional development) requirements for PAs
•    developing accreditation standards for training programmes that deliver PA education
•    standards of clinical competence, cultural competence and ethical conduct for PAs
•    establishing fees for applications for registration and for practising certificates for PAs. 

Consultation on these matters will take place at a later date.