But they’re yet to find a foothold in general practice, the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association says.
Registered nurse prescribers gained the authority to prescribe PBS medicines this week, but it will be a while yet before qualified RNs are in GP practices.
Consultations on nurse prescribing have been ongoing since 2016, with the Health Legislation Amendment (Prescribing of Pharmaceutical Benefits) Bill 2025 representing the latest expansion of nurse practitioners’ scope of practice.
Allowing registered nurses to practice to their full scope would enhance access to medicine, particularly in underserved regional and remote communities and among vulnerable populations who place great trust in nurses, the Senate Committee report read.
RNs comprise 54.5% of the Australian health workforce and are the most geographically distributed health profession.
Denise Lyons, president of the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association, told Health Services Daily the bill amendment was an exciting opportunity for nurses to better meet their communities’ needs.
“This is a critical step to ensure that patients can access affordable medication,” she said.
As a generalist primary care nurse practitioner, Ms Lyons told HSD the initiative was still awaiting take-off.
“We don’t have any [RN prescribers] working in general practice yet, because it’s early days,” she said.
RN prescribing courses in Australia began earlier this year, and the first cohort of graduates is not expected until later this year.
While the AMA suggested stronger safeguards for RN prescribing, with Schedule 8 medicines such as opiates excluded entirely, Ms Lyons said robust safeguards were already in place.
“Nurses must first have general registration with no conditions and the equivalent of three years’ full-time post-clinical registration experience – approximately 5000 hours,” she said.
“Then they must complete Nurses and Midwives Board (NMBA)-approved units of study, usually a six-month postgraduate study.”
Authorised RNs will undertake prescribing only in partnership with an authorised health practitioner such as a GP.
Once endorsed, RN prescribers must also complete six months of clinical mentorship with an authorised health practitioner to develop “confidence in prescribing”, as per AHPRA guidelines.
RN prescribers will have access to the national real-time prescription monitoring system – serving as both a safety measure and an audit tool to track who is prescribing which medications, Ms Lyons said.
They will also be subject to review and investigation under the Professional Services Review scheme.
Ms Lyons said RNs’ capabilities in general practice were underused, and reforms could enable multidisciplinary teams to work at their full capacity.
“There’s so much work that nurses could be doing if we could remove some of the structural barriers, like the funding models that limit what they can do,” she said.
Ms Lyons said theworkforce incentive program was not enough to support a substantial nursing workforce in general practice.
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The CEO of the Australian College of Nurses, Professor Katheryn Zeitz, said RN prescribing was Australia’s most significant advance in nursing’s role in a “generation”.
“The evidence shows nurse prescribing improves patient outcomes, increases satisfaction with care, and reduces the burden on our hospitals and GPs,” she said.
As it remains unclear which PBS medications RN prescribers may prescribe, the ACN called for clarity as nurses complete their training, and for timely transparency on the bill’s implementation, so nurses could make informed career decisions.
The Rural Doctors Association of Australia similarly supported the bill and said the PBS would ensure nurse-prescribed medications wouldn’t be available only to patients able to pay privately.