Who Can Sell CPD to a South African Health Professional?

South Africa operates one of the stricter CPD accreditation gates anywhere. It is not enough for a provider to be accredited: each individual learning activity must be accredited before it is delivered, the accreditation expires after twelve months, and online activities are accreditable only at the lower two levels. Anyone planning to sell training to South African health professionals needs to understand the gate before costing the content.

What the practitioner has to accumulate

Start with the demand side, because it sets the shape of what can be sold. Under Board Notice 701 of 2024, made under section 26 of the Health Professions Act 56 of 1974 and published on 13 December 2024, continuing education units are accumulated "over a period of twelve months", with the Table giving 30 CEUs for medical practitioners, dentists, psychologists and physiotherapists, of which 5 must be in ethics, human rights and health law. Supplementary and assistant registers carry 15 and 2; laboratory assistants 10 and 1.

The change that matters commercially is in Rule 4(2): CEUs "shall be valid for a period of twelve months from the date of accumulation." The predecessor rule, Board Notice 29 of 2007, allowed two years. The instrument is published by the South African government, and the 2007 original is on the Law Library's legislation archive.

Halving the shelf life changes buying behaviour. Under a two-year window a practitioner could front-load. Under a twelve-month window every CEU has to be earned inside the year it counts for, which makes CPD a recurring annual purchase rather than an occasional one.

The gate: per-activity, in advance

The 2007 rules set up the structure that still operates. Rule 10(1) provides that a provider "may apply to council or its accreditors for accreditation as a service provider." The Council accredits directly, or through accreditors — institutions it appoints for the purpose.

The crucial requirement is activity-level and prospective. HPCSA's CPD Guidelines require providers to "submit each of their learning activities to an accreditor for review and accreditation prior to presenting the CPD activity". Not the catalogue. Each activity, before delivery. For certain Level 2 short courses the Guidelines state plainly that "Prior approval by an accreditor necessary".

And Board Notice 701 of 2024 reinforces it from the practitioner's side: the prescribed CEUs must be accumulated through "activities accredited by the council in any of the following levels of activities." An unaccredited activity does not produce CEUs, however good it is.

Two further details worth planning around. Accreditation is valid for twelve months under Rule 10(8), so it is a renewing administrative cost rather than a one-off. And an accreditor is itself "appointed by a Professional Board once it has met the criteria set out by the HPCSA CPD Committee", with the role of reviewing and approving applications for the provision of CPD activities — so there is a layer between the provider and the Council.

The ceiling on online delivery

This is the single most load-bearing sentence for any digital provider. HPCSA's Guidelines state that "Online CPD activities that can be accredited include Level 1 - 2 as per CPD Guidelines."

Online is accreditable, but only at the lower two levels. Higher-level activities are not available through online delivery, which caps what a purely digital offer can address regardless of quality. If your proposition depends on delivering the full CEU requirement online, that is a constraint to design around rather than a detail.

The Guidelines are published by HPCSA, dated November 2021.

Overseas activities do count, with a condition

Better news for international providers than the accreditation gate suggests. The Guidelines provide that where a practitioner attends "an accredited professional or academic meeting or activity abroad, it will be recognised for CPD purposes" — for practitioners practising in South Africa. Where an international activity lacks equivalent recognition in the country where it is held, a South African accreditor may accredit it.

So the route exists. It runs through a South African accreditor rather than around it.

One live caveat on enforcement

A notice dated 20 April 2026, issued by HPCSA Corporate Affairs and signed by the Interim Registrar, states that CPD "will not be a mandatory requirement when renewing annual registration" this year, while "practitioners are still required to maintain their CPD compliance to ensure continuation of registration."

We are flagging the provenance rather than glossing it: that notice appears on hpcsa-blogs.co.za, not on hpcsa.co.za, and we could not corroborate it on the Council's main site. Treat it as a reported relaxation at the renewal counter, with the underlying rules unchanged, and check directly before relying on it. It is also, by its own wording, specific to this year.

What to take from this

If you are buying: your CEUs must come from accredited activities, each accredited before it ran, and they expire twelve months after you earn them.

If you are selling: budget for per-activity accreditation through an accreditor, renewed annually, and accept a Level 1 to 2 ceiling on anything delivered online. And do not describe yourself as accredited until an accreditor has said so in writing — the gate is specific enough that a loose claim is checkable.

South Africa is unusually layered in this respect even within its own borders: pharmacists file six portfolio entries rather than hours, covered in SAPC pharmacist CPD, and attorneys have no CPD requirement at all, set out in South African attorneys have no mandatory CPD. Across the continent the models diverge further still — see why there is no such thing as African CPD.

This article quotes the Board Notices and HPCSA Guidelines as published. Rules, CEU values and accreditation arrangements are revised; verify with HPCSA before relying on any of it commercially.