Regulating pre-hospital
urgent and emergency clinical responders
in non-statutory roles



CQC, Disclosure & Barring Service, National Police Chiefs' Council, NHS Safeguarding, and the Independent Ambulance Association recognise the Health Practice Associates Council register in supporting the safe recruitment of non-paramedic ambulance clinicians.




The Health Practice Associates Council (HPAC) is the United Kingdom’s regulatory body for pre-hospital urgent and emergency clinical responders in non-statutory roles.

Continue reading...

HPAC officially forms part of the Disclosure & Barring Service's Safeguarding Landscape. We revalidate all DBS certificates daily, ensuring we hold the most up-to-date Enhanced DBS information on all registrants. Registrants can prove DBS validity by scanning their ID cards. HPAC also shares relevant referrals with the DBS.

Slide provided by DBS to HPAC for dissemination




The Health Practice Associates Council is a Community Interest Company (CIC) registered in England and Wales (10830551), regulated by the Information Commissioner's Office and the Office of the Regulator of Community Interest Companies.




* While our application process is rigorous and includes thorough checks of documentation and backgrounds — including manually cross-referencing over 25 registers, barred lists, criminal records and tribunal records for every applicant — to guarantee 100% assurance of all the data and statements provided by all applicants and registrants would be misleading to the public and stakeholders. On rare occasions, a dishonest applicant may progress through our due diligence processes. When discovered, they are immediately marked as “removed from the register”, employers are notified, and referrals made to the police and DBS.

** As HPAC has thousands of registrants and applications combined, we conduct a 5% randomised audit of statutory and CPD documents annually, inline with HCPC and other regulator standards.

*** Some registrants may forget to re-enrol on the DBS Update Service or it may lapse, creating a temporary gap while we process a new DBS. We generally operate at 96% compliance and continually work to improve that metric.