The Ama and Chiropractic

The State and Territory Competition Policy Reform Acts of 1995 applied the competitive conduct rules to Australian professions, including the medical profession, for the first time. The competitive conduct rules are basically the prohibitions on restrictive trading practices contained in Part IV of the Trade Practices Act. As the medical profession was effectively sheltered from the operation of Trade Practices Act until the Reform Acts of 1995, the profession was able to engage in a number of activities that would have been prohibited in other commercial operations. The Reform Acts placed professions and professional associations such as the Australian Medical Association (AMA) in a position where they had to re-evaluate past practices to ensure they complied with the law. The purpose of this article is to look at the AMA's historic approach to chiropractic and to outline its position with respect to chiropractic since the Competition Policy Reform Acts of 1995.