hi everybody i'm sally i'm a radiographer working in melbourne australia and last
week i got a question from an audience so in this video i'm going to overshare with you
how to become a radiographer in australia so there are two pathways you can take the first one would
be to study in australia there are i think nine universities here that offer bachelor degree or
master degree of medical imaging if you are a year 12 student hoping to enroll in the
bachelor of medical imaging there are two things you need to keep in mind the first one is you need
to check the university subject prerequisite from memory you will need to do one of the two
math subjects math method or specialist math and you also have to do one of the two science
subjects i think it's either physics or biology so double check so you don't get disappointed and the
other thing is that you need an ATAR of minimum 91 and if you get anything above 95 i think you are
guaranteed that you will get an over let's talk about the uni fee so for a domestic student it
would cost roughly eight thousand dollars a year but if you are an international student like i was
a four year bachelor degree would cost roughly two hundred thousand dollars so it is quite
expensive but there are two advantages of studying in australia the first one is as long as you pass
all the units and you graduate you are guaranteed that you will be qualified as a radiographer and
the second advantage is that hopefully after four years of studying you will have a network
of radiography friends and you will know all the chief radiographers from the hospitals and
clinics so hopefully it will be easy for you to find a job now the second pathway would be for
overseas qualified radiographer it is a little bit more complicated there's a lot more detail
we need to go through i will explain a bit more later before we get started i want to let you
guys know that all of the references i will link them on my blog so you can check them out later
and i also have a facebook page where i put all of my answer to your questions so have a look
you'll find out more information about life as a radiographer so overall there are five steps you
need to take in order to become a radiographer in australia so those steps mostly apply to
international students and overseas qualified radiographer but even if you are a domestic
student or an australian resident i think there's still some helpful tips there so step number one
you need a skill assessment from ASMIRT so ASMIRT is the australian society of medical imaging and
radiation therapy it is also previously known as AIR the australian institute of radiography
they changed the name maybe six years ago they exactly the same organization just with a new
name so asmr is the assessing authority of radiographers for immigration so they perform
skill assessment on migrants to see if they meet the australian standard so basically you need
to get the ASMIRT skill assessment in order to apply it for a working visa so the assessment fee
is two hundred and ninety eight dollars estimate will take into consideration of your degree
your skill set your years of experience to see if you fulfill the requirement
to become a radiographer in australia so if you pass you will get a statement of accreditation
saying that you have fulfilled the requirement to practice diagnostic radiography in australia
so there is no pre-approved radiography course recognized by the ASMIRT except the new zealand
one so as i mentioned before in australia you need a minimum of a bachelor degree in order to
become a radiographer so if your overseas degree is something like a diploma or anything that's
less than four years it would be quite difficult for you to pass the statement of accreditation
but over the years i have seen some overseas radiographers doing some of the university units
to make up for what's missing in their degree so maybe it is possible for you to combine australian
study with your overseas degree so double check with ASMIRT and see what you can do step two
you need to meet the registration requirements by AHPRA and MRPBA so AHPRA is the australian
health practitioner regulation agencies it looks after all of the healthcare workers
so nurses doctors radiographers physiotherapists all of us have to be registered with the board
in order to practice legally in australia MRPBA the medical radiation practice board of
australia is an extension of apra so mrpba is responsible for all of the healthcare workers
who use medical radiation as part of their jobs so say radiographers radiation therapists nuclear
medicine technologists so for older overseas qualified radiographer there is a national exam
you need to pass in order to register with the MRPBA but if you study radiography in australia
you don't need to sit for that exam so even though i was an international student i did
not have to sit for the exam luckily so i can't really tell you how difficult it is but i'll put
the exam guideline on my blog so you can have a look there's a difference between the assessment
from ASMIRT and the assessment from MRPBA so skill assessment from ASMIRT is for immigration purpose
and they also take into consideration of your work experience when they assessing your skills
whereas on the other hand MRPBA under the current national law they can only take into account of
your qualification so even though you might get the skill assessment from asmr it doesn't mean you
definitely get the mrpba registration so in some cases some people can get the skill assessment
but cannot register with MRPBA you need both in order to come to australia to work but just
because you get one doesn't mean you get the other one step number three you need to meet
the english requirement which is the proficient level so proficiency level means you need to get
an overall of minimum seven in ielts so there are a lot of other english tests that you can
take and i'll put the um score definition here so you will need that score not just for the ASMIRT
skill assessment requirement but also for most of the working visa as a radiographer and your
ielt s exam result is valid for two years so it's never too early to start step number four you need
to find a suitable visa now visa is a huge topic i have made a video about my visa timeline you
can go check it out just give you a rough idea how long it can take but there are like 12 different
options for overseas radiographers so there are many different variables you can take into account
for example is the hospital or company gonna sponsor you do you have any family relative in
australia who can sponsor you and it also depends where you want to go work and live because say if
you want to go and work in sydney you might not get as many visa options and that's because the
australian government is trying to encourage migrants to go live in the regional areas so if
you want to work and live in a big city you might not be eligible for some of the working visas so
you better double check okay number five the final step will be all the other important things so you
need to check your fascination record so in order to work in australia especially the healthcare
system you need to be fully vaccinated i even have to find my hong kong baby vaccination booklet to
prove that i'm fully fascinated for hepatitis bcg polio and all the rest and also before my
first year placement i need to have my blood test done to prove that i'm fully vaccinated so that is
something that you need to keep in mind if you're not fully fascinated you might have to get that
done before you start your job in australia and the second thing would be police check so you need
to pass a police check and sometimes even working with children check in order to work in a hospital
or clinic so if you're an overseas radiographer or international student you also have to provide a
police check from the country that you have lived in in you know the past 10 years or something so
hopefully you haven't done anything bad and you can pass your police check and the other thing
mostly for the international migrants would be a health check so before you arrive in australia
you will probably get an x-ray to check if you got any TB you'll get a blood test to make
sure you don't carry any infectious disease so hopefully you will also pass the final blood test