The 7 Excluded Activity Categories (§18.12)
DHA Manual v1.3 §18.12 explicitly lists seven categories of activities that cannot be claimed as CPD for DHA license renewal. These are verbatim from the DHA Manual. Each entry below includes real-world examples and the regulatory rationale.
This exclusion list is DHA-specific — DOH uses positive filtering, not a blacklist
- Daily 8am patient handover / morning briefing
- Weekly ward rounds with consultant
- Grand rounds at your hospital
- Case review meetings
- Morbidity and mortality (M&M) conferences
These are routine clinical workflow activities — coordination and service delivery, not structured professional development with defined learning objectives. The regularity and operational nature of these activities distinguishes them from CPD, which must add new knowledge or skills beyond your baseline competency.
- Monthly departmental meetings
- Medical staff committee sessions
- Internal quality improvement (QI) meetings
- Medical staff organisation (MSO) meetings
- Internal clinical governance meetings
Administrative coordination among colleagues does not constitute professional education. While valuable for hospital operations, these meetings serve organisational purposes rather than advancing individual professional competency. They lack the structured curriculum, learning objectives, and assessment components that characterise CPD.
- Health fair booth staffing
- Patient education talks (e.g., diabetes management for patients)
- Public health awareness campaigns
- Community outreach events
- Patient support group facilitation
The target audience is the general public or patients, not professional peers. CPD must develop the professional's own knowledge and skills. Activities where you are the educator, not the learner, do not qualify — unless teaching in a formally accredited CPD programme (which is a different and acceptable category for some authorities).
- Television or radio health segments
- Newspaper or magazine health columns
- Public webinars for non-professionals
- Social media health content creation
- Public health advocacy appearances
Similar to community sessions, these activities are directed at the general public rather than at professional development. The criterion is the audience, not the topic: healthcare content delivered to a lay audience does not constitute professional upskilling regardless of how clinically accurate or socially valuable it is.
- Electronic Medical Record (EMR) / HIS system training
- Microsoft Office or productivity tool training
- Hospital IT rollout and onboarding sessions
- PACS or radiology viewer training from vendor
- Administrative system training
Digital and IT skills are operational competencies, not clinical or professional development. Even if the software is healthcare-specific (e.g., an EMR system), training on how to use it is a tool skill, not professional education. The exception would be a certified health informatics course that meets CPD accreditation standards.
- New employee hospital orientation (first-week induction)
- Department onboarding sessions for new hires
- New credentialing orientation
- Health and safety induction
Induction is a one-time onboarding process, not ongoing professional development. It familiarises new employees with organisational systems and policies, not with advances in clinical practice or professional standards. DHA recognises that this is baseline orientation rather than education that adds to a professional's competency above their existing baseline.
- Medical device vendor demos and product training
- Pharmaceutical sales representative product briefings
- Brand-specific drug information sessions
- Equipment manufacturer training sessions
- Instrument or consumable product knowledge sessions
Commercial training delivered by suppliers promotes a product, not independent professional education. Even if a vendor provides a 'CME certificate,' DHA does not recognise product-specific training from the product's own supplier as qualifying CPD. Independently accredited conferences that happen to discuss a product (e.g., a cardiology conference with a device demonstration as part of the scientific programme) are different and may qualify.
DOH vs DHA: Different Approaches, Same Goal
DOH and DHA both aim to ensure CPD represents genuine professional development — but they use different regulatory mechanisms to enforce this:
Activities must affirmatively qualify as Category 1 (formally accredited) or Category 2 (non-formal with defined criteria). There is no published exclusion list — the question is whether the activity meets the Category 1 or Category 2 definition.
“Does this activity qualify?”
DHA publishes an explicit list of excluded activities. Anything not on the list mayqualify — but must still meet DHA’s accreditation, specialty, and documentation requirements. The list addresses the most common misunderstandings.
“Is this activity on the exclusion list?”
What DOES Count for DHA CPD
Qualifying DHA CPD activities include:
| Activity | Type |
|---|---|
| DHA-accredited conferences and workshops (with DHA approval number) | Accredited |
| Accredited online courses — specialty-related (100% online now permitted) | Accredited |
| Academic study and formal degree programmes | Academic |
| DHA assessment panel participation (§18.11 — counts for the calendar year) | DHA Activity |
| Peer-reviewed journal article authorship (10 pts per publication) | Academic |
| MEDLINE-indexed publication authorship | Academic |
| Specialty board certification | Professional |
| International conference attendance (from recognized accreditation bodies) | Accredited |
| Accredited clinical simulation workshops | Accredited |
| Accredited e-learning modules with specialty content | Online |
Note: All qualifying DHA CPD must be documented with appropriate proof. Online programmes must be specialty-related (§18.7). Multi-year license holders must accumulate proportional points (2-year license = 2× annual target).
Common Scenarios
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