Skip to content

We’re hiring doctors! Learn more

ADHD rules by state

ADHD rules in Victoria

In Victoria the rules turn on which kind of medicine is involved. For stimulant medicines, the state runs a permit system: a psychiatrist can assess an adult and prescribe without a permit, while a GP has to apply to the Department of Health for one, and the department's policy is that it will generally only grant that where a specialist has already diagnosed you and reviewed you recently. Non-stimulant ADHD medicines sit outside that permit system entirely, so the permit rules are not a reason to wait for a specialist if a GP judges a non-stimulant is appropriate. Victoria has announced that 150 GPs will be trained to diagnose and treat ADHD themselves, but that training only runs across September and October 2026 and the law has not yet been changed to allow it, so on 21 August 2026 that route does not exist yet.

Last checked 2026-08-21. These rules change, sometimes at short notice. We date every page and cite the source we used, so you can check it yourself. Nothing here is advice about your own treatment — your prescriber and your state health department are the authorities on that.

Who can diagnose you

Who is allowed to make the diagnosis here?

Victorian medicines law does not regulate who may diagnose ADHD. It regulates who may prescribe certain medicines. The practical effect for an adult is indirect: where a stimulant medicine is involved, the Department of Health's permit policy requires evidence of a specialist diagnosis before a GP will be granted a permit, so in practice an adult seeking stimulant treatment needs a psychiatrist's diagnosis. Where a non-stimulant medicine is involved, no Victorian permit applies and this constraint does not arise.

We searched the full text of both current instruments. The Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act 1981 (Vic), version 145, incorporating amendments as at 1 July 2026, contains no reference to ADHD or attention deficit disorder and no reference to general practitioners. The Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Regulations 2017 (Vic), version 021, incorporating amendments as at 1 July 2026, refers to attention deficit disorder exactly once, in the regulation 10 exemption. Neither instrument says who may diagnose. The constraint comes from Department of Health policy attached to prescribing. Its stimulants permit page states: 'The department's policy is that specialist involvement is necessary for the diagnosis and ongoing management of all ADHD patients.' The same page states that general practitioners 'will generally only be issued with permits to prescribe [the stimulant medicines] where there is evidence of a specialist diagnosis and that a specialist review has taken place within a specified period.' The page does not say what that period is. This is a prescribing gate, not a diagnostic monopoly. A psychologist or another clinician may assess an adult, but a psychologist is not a prescriber, and we could not confirm whether a psychologist's report satisfies the Department's 'evidence of a specialist diagnosis' test for permit purposes. A change is announced but not in force. The Department's ADHD care in general practice page states that 150 GPs 'will undertake a training program to enable them to safely diagnose and treat ADHD in both adults and children aged 6 years and over', that successful applicants were informed in late July 2026, and that 'The 150 GPs will complete training across September and October 2026.' As at 21 August 2026 that training has not begun. Separately, no enabling legal instrument exists: we text-searched the current Act and Regulations and neither creates any authorised-GP class.

Who can start treatment

Who can start you on medicine, and what approval do they need?

It depends on the medicine category. For a STIMULANT medicine (a Schedule 8 poison) in an adult: a psychiatrist may initiate with no Victorian permit, provided the patient is not a drug-dependent person. A GP or a nurse practitioner must hold a permit issued by the Secretary to the Department of Health, and departmental policy is that permits go to GPs to continue specialist-diagnosed treatment rather than to start it. For a NON-STIMULANT ADHD medicine: no Victorian permit and no Victorian warrant applies at all, because the permit system attaches to Schedule 8 poisons and ADHD does not appear among the restricted Schedule 4 categories that require a warrant.

STIMULANT MEDICINES. Two separate permits exist and they are alternative, not cumulative. Regulation 10(1) provides that a special Schedule 8 permit is required only where, among other conditions, 'the Schedule 8 poison is a special Schedule 8 poison' and 'section 34 of the Act does not require the practitioner to apply to the Secretary for a Schedule 8 permit'. Section 34 requires a Schedule 8 permit once treatment of a non-drug-dependent patient runs for a continuous period greater than 8 weeks. Regulation 10(3) provides, verbatim, that 'A special Schedule 8 permit is not required for a paediatrician or psychiatrist to issue a prescription, supply, authorise the administration of or administer any of the following poisons for the treatment of a person for attention deficit disorder', followed by a closed list. That exemption carries NO age limit. The adult/child split comes from a different instrument: the Secretary's notice under s 35A published in Victoria Government Gazette No. S 463 on 31 August 2023, which governs the separate 8-week permit. Its circumstance 3 covers a person '18 years old or older' and requires that 'the registered medical practitioner is a psychiatrist'; circumstance 2, for people under 18, allows 'a paediatrician or psychiatrist'. The Department's gazettal notices page still lists the 31 August 2023 notice as the current s 35A notice. The consequence: a psychiatrist treating an adult needs no permit at either stage. A paediatrician treating an adult needs no special Schedule 8 permit, but does need a Schedule 8 permit once treatment exceeds 8 weeks. Every other prescriber needs a permit. Regulation 10(1) and ss 34-34F apply to 'a registered medical practitioner, a nurse practitioner or a paramedic practitioner', and the ADHD exemption in reg 10(3) names only a paediatrician or psychiatrist, so a nurse practitioner has no exemption. Regulation 17(f) makes it an offence, penalty 100 penalty units, for a registered medical practitioner to prescribe a special Schedule 8 poison where a permit is required and not held. Regulations 20, 39, 80 and 91(3) impose the same prohibitions on nurse practitioners. NON-STIMULANT MEDICINES. Victoria's permit system attaches to Schedule 8 poisons. The Department states: 'In most circumstances in Victoria, medical practitioners require a permit before they can prescribe a Schedule 8 poison.' Victoria separately restricts a small group of Schedule 4 medicines through a warrant system; the Department's warrants page, updated 16 February 2026, lists five categories of restricted Schedule 4 medicine, covering dermatological, fertility, obstetric and immunomodulatory uses, and ADHD does not appear anywhere on that page. Non-stimulant ADHD medicines are also absent from the SafeScript monitored list, which covers Schedule 8 medicines plus a defined group of higher-risk Schedule 4 medicines (sedative-hypnotics, one antipsychotic, certain opioid-containing products and certain analgesic and neuropathic-pain medicines). On the Victorian regulatory side, therefore, nothing stands between a GP and a non-stimulant ADHD medicine. Whether a GP will diagnose and treat is a clinical question, and Commonwealth PBS subsidy is a separate restriction we did not verify. A PBS authority is not a Victorian authority, and this catches prescribers out. Departmental guidance states that authority prescriptions 'merely indicate that Medicare Australia will subsidise the cost of the medicine; medical practitioners must still comply with the requirements for a Schedule 8 treatment permit under Victorian legislation.' ANNOUNCED, NOT IN FORCE. There is no GP pathway to diagnose and initiate stimulant treatment for an adult operating on 21 August 2026. The Department states 150 GPs will complete training across September and October 2026. Completing training will not by itself change the law: we text-searched the current Act (v145) and Regulations (v021) and found no authorised-GP class, and the gazettal notices page lists no notice later than 31 August 2023. An amendment or a fresh Secretary's notice is still required and we could not find one.

Who can continue it

Once you are stable, who can keep prescribing?

For a stimulant medicine, a psychiatrist may continue an adult's treatment with no permit. A GP may continue only if they hold their own patient-specific permit, or another practitioner at the same clinic holds one and the prescribing complies with it, or a permit application has been submitted immediately for a patient they have taken over. A specialist's approval is not itself authority to prescribe. For a non-stimulant medicine, no permit applies.

The Department sets out three routes for a non-exempt prescriber. Own permit. The permit is issued to a named practitioner for a named patient. Section 35 makes it an offence to prescribe to a patient holding a Schedule 8 permit 'other than for the period specified in the permit for that administration, supply or prescription' or 'in excess of the quantity specified in the permit'. Penalty: 100 penalty units. Departmental guidance separately states that permits commonly specify a maximum daily dosage and an expiry date and that exceeding these 'represents a contravention of the Act', but the Department does not identify a section, and s 35 as enacted covers period and quantity only. Multiple-practitioner clinic. Section 34E, and the Department's permits page: 'Where a current permit is held by one practitioner at a multiple-practitioner clinic, other practitioners at the same clinic may prescribe the specified Schedule 8 poison/s provided the prescribing is in accordance with any limits or conditions specified on the permit.' Inherited patients. 'A practitioner who is not initiating treatment but considers it necessary to treat a patient with a Schedule 8 poison ... must immediately apply for a permit if there is reason to believe that issuing a prescription will contribute to a patient being treated for a continuous period greater than 8 weeks.' And: 'To avoid delaying treatment for a genuine patient, a practitioner is authorised to treat the patient until the outcome of the permit application has been determined provided a permit application is submitted immediately.' A specialist's endorsement is not authority. The Department states that 'Issuing a prescription or otherwise authorising treatment, simply because another practitioner has done so, is unlikely to satisfy the regulatory requirement to take all reasonable steps to ensure there is a therapeutic need', and that medical practitioners 'should not issue a prescription or otherwise authorise treatment without satisfying themselves that it is safe, appropriate and lawful to treat the patient with the medicine.' SafeScript. Since 1 April 2020 prescribers and pharmacists must 'take all reasonable steps to check SafeScript when prescribing or supplying a high-risk medicine.' Stimulant medicines are monitored because they are Schedule 8. A VIRTUAL EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT ROUTE IS ANNOUNCED, NOT YET OPEN TO ADULTS. The Department states the service will 'provide short-term access to ADHD prescriptions for people with an existing ADHD diagnosis who require urgent access to medication and cannot access their usual treating clinician', that 'Adults will be able to access the service from September 2026. It is currently available for children under 18 years', and that it 'is designed to act as a safety net, not a replacement for routine or ongoing ADHD care.' The Department publishes NO supply duration. As at 21 August 2026 the service's own public site does not mention ADHD. The RANZCP Victorian Branch and RACGP Victoria opposed the measure on clinical safety grounds on 4 February 2026, and recorded that the service's website 'is an emergency care service and does not do routine prescription refills.'

Telehealth

Can this happen by video, and does the practitioner have to be here?

We found no Victorian requirement for an in-person consultation before an ADHD assessment or before prescribing. Victorian law regulates the permit, the prescriber's duties and the SafeScript check, not the mode of consultation. Telehealth does not displace the permit rules: a non-psychiatrist prescribing a stimulant medicine to an adult still needs a permit however the consultation is conducted. Whether Medicare will rebate a given telehealth consultation is a separate Commonwealth question we did not verify.

Regulation 17 sets out what a registered medical practitioner must satisfy before issuing a prescription for a Schedule 8 poison, and none of it concerns the mode of consultation. It requires that the person is under the practitioner's care and named in the prescription, that the practitioner has taken all reasonable steps to ensure a therapeutic need exists, that the prescription is not issued merely to support drug dependence, that the practitioner has taken all reasonable steps to ascertain the person's identity, and that any required special Schedule 8 permit is held. Penalty: 100 penalty units. The identity duty is the one that bites hardest on a first telehealth consultation with a new patient. The Department's general standard is that practitioners 'should not issue a prescription or otherwise authorise treatment without satisfying themselves that it is safe, appropriate and lawful to treat the patient with the medicine', and that prescribing simply because another practitioner has done so 'is unlikely to satisfy the regulatory requirement to take all reasonable steps to ensure there is a therapeutic need.' The SafeScript check applies on each occasion before prescribing a monitored medicine, and has since 1 April 2020. We did not verify the national professional standard from a primary source in this session. The Medical Board of Australia's telehealth guidelines are the applicable professional standard and should be read directly before anything is published about what telehealth is clinically appropriate for; we could not retrieve that page and have not stated its wording here. Nor did we verify the Commonwealth MBS telehealth eligibility rules. Both are listed as unconfirmed.

If you move here

What happens to a diagnosis and treatment from another state?

Nothing in Victorian law cancels or re-opens a diagnosis made in another state, because Victorian law does not regulate diagnosis. An existing Schedule 8 prescription written by an AHPRA-registered practitioner in another state may be dispensed at a Victorian pharmacy. What changes is that a new Victorian prescriber must satisfy Victorian permit rules: a psychiatrist needs no permit for a non-drug-dependent adult, while a GP must apply, and departmental policy requires evidence of a specialist diagnosis and a specialist review within a period the Department does not publish.

DISPENSING. Since 1 July 2010 'a registered medical practitioner is defined as a medical practitioner who is registered under the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA)', and the Department states: 'This means that prescriptions for Schedule 8 medicines from medical practitioners in other states may be dispensed at pharmacies in Victoria.' The Victorian pharmacist must still be satisfied the medicine is safe and appropriate and the prescription lawful, 'whether the prescriber is located locally or interstate.' THE NEW VICTORIAN PRESCRIBER. If they are a psychiatrist, no permit step arises for a non-drug-dependent adult. If they are a GP or nurse practitioner, a permit is needed for a stimulant medicine, and the Department's published basis for issuing one to a GP is evidence of a specialist diagnosis and a specialist review 'within a specified period'. A January 2015 departmental policy still linked from the Department's permits page states that period as 'within the last 12 months', but that document is eleven years old and is demonstrably out of date on an adjacent point, so we do not publish 12 months as the current rule. A person whose last specialist review is old may need a fresh one before a GP's permit application succeeds, but we cannot say how old is too old. THE BRIDGE. Treatment need not stop while the paperwork runs. The Department: 'To avoid delaying treatment for a genuine patient, a practitioner is authorised to treat the patient until the outcome of the permit application has been determined provided a permit application is submitted immediately.' NON-STIMULANT MEDICINES. If treatment is with a non-stimulant medicine, none of the permit machinery above applies, because it attaches to Schedule 8 poisons and ADHD is not among Victoria's restricted Schedule 4 warrant categories. ON ARRIVAL. The new prescriber must check SafeScript before each prescription for a monitored medicine, take all reasonable steps to establish identity and therapeutic need, and cannot prescribe merely because a previous practitioner did.

What we could not confirm

We went looking for these and could not find a primary source. We would rather show you the gap than fill it with something that sounds right. Take these to your prescriber or the department directly.

  • How recent a specialist review must be for a GP to be granted a permit. The Department's current page says only 'within a specified period' and names no timeframe. A January 2015 departmental policy, still linked from the Department's permits page, says 'within the last 12 months', but that document is eleven years old and is stale on a neighbouring point (it describes the paediatrician and psychiatrist exemption as limited to patients under 18, which regulation 10(3) is not). We do not treat 12 months as the current rule.
  • Whether the Department's January 2015 permit policy still reflects current assessment practice in any respect, including its statement that permits 'will generally only be issued to neurologists, paediatricians or psychiatrists'.
  • The standard duration of a Victorian Schedule 8 or special Schedule 8 permit for ADHD. Neither instrument nor any departmental page states a fixed term. A two-year permit term, a six-month maximum prescription length and a psychiatrist review to renew appear in a Victorian primary health network guide for GPs, but we could not confirm any of the three against a departmental or legislative source.
  • Whether any legal instrument has been made to authorise the 150 RACGP-trained GPs to diagnose and initiate for adults, and when it would commence. We text-searched the current Act (v145) and Regulations (v021) and found no authorised-GP class and no ADHD provision beyond the reg 10(3) paediatrician and psychiatrist exemption. The Department's gazettal notices page lists no s 35A notice later than 31 August 2023. Completing the training will not by itself change the law.
  • Whether GPs who complete that training will need a permit for each adult patient, or will be exempted in the way psychiatrists are. No source addresses this.
  • Whether Victoria's permit requirement attaches to a prescriber physically located in another state or territory who consults a Victorian patient by telehealth. The Department's interstate page addresses dispensing in Victoria, and prescribing by practitioners in Victoria. It explicitly does not address the reverse scenario, and neither does the Act or the Regulations. This is a genuine gap in the published material.
  • The scheduling of each individual non-stimulant ADHD medicine. We confirmed that Victoria's permit system attaches to Schedule 8 poisons, that ADHD does not appear among the five restricted Schedule 4 categories requiring a warrant, and that non-stimulant ADHD medicines are absent from the SafeScript monitored list. We did not verify each medicine against the Commonwealth Poisons Standard, so we state the category rule and not a medicine-by-medicine one.
  • PBS subsidy conditions for adult ADHD treatment, including any restriction keyed to the age at which a person was diagnosed. This is a Commonwealth matter, it is separate from Victorian permit rules, and we did not verify it from a PBS or Services Australia source in this session.
  • The Medical Board of Australia's telehealth guidelines. The Board's page could not be retrieved (it returns 403 to automated fetching), so we have not stated its wording. It is the applicable national professional standard and must be read directly before publishing anything about when telehealth is clinically appropriate.
  • The Commonwealth MBS telehealth eligibility rules that changed on 1 November 2025, and how they apply to GP versus consultant psychiatrist items. We could not retrieve the AskMBS advisory.
  • Any supply duration for the announced Virtual Emergency Department ADHD service. The Department publishes none. A figure of 'up to six months' circulated but appears only as a characterisation inside a professional bodies' objection, not as a government-stated rule, and 'at least 30 days' has no locatable source at all. We publish no duration.
  • Whether the Virtual Emergency Department adult ADHD service will in fact commence in September 2026, and on what eligibility terms. As at 21 August 2026 the service's own public site does not mention ADHD.
  • Whether a nurse practitioner can obtain a Victorian permit to prescribe stimulant medicines for adult ADHD and on what conditions. Regulation 10(1) and ss 34-34F plainly cover nurse practitioners and the reg 10(3) exemption does not, so a permit would be required, but we found no departmental policy addressing nurse practitioner applications for ADHD.
  • Whether an assessment by a psychologist or another non-medical practitioner satisfies the Department's 'evidence of a specialist diagnosis' test for permit purposes.
  • Whether any s 35A gazette notice has been made since the Department's gazettal notices page was last updated on 5 November 2025. A later notice would not necessarily appear there, and we could not search the 2026 gazette index.
  • Any Victoria-specific published wait time for adult ADHD assessment, public or private. We found no figure from a Victorian government or health service source. Figures circulating on clinic and directory marketing pages are not sources.

What changed recently

  1. 2023-08-31

    A new notice under s 35A(1) of the Act revoked all previous s 35A notices and specified the circumstances in which treatment may run beyond 8 weeks without a Schedule 8 permit. Circumstance 3 covers a person aged 18 or over and requires the prescriber to be a psychiatrist; circumstance 2, for under 18s, allows a paediatrician or psychiatrist. This is the source of the adult/child split and is still listed by the Department as the current notice.

    Victoria Government Gazette — Special Gazette No. S 463

  2. 2025-11-21

    Department of Health 'Schedule 8 permits and notifications' page last updated, setting out the 8-week trigger, the multiple-practitioner clinic rule, and the rule allowing a practitioner who takes over a patient to treat while a permit application is determined.

    Victorian Department of Health — Schedule 8 permits and notifications

  3. 2025-11-24

    Department of Health stimulants permit page last updated, retaining the position that a psychiatrist needs no special permit for a non-drug-dependent patient aged 18 or over, that the paediatrician limb of that departmental summary is expressed as applying under 18, and that GP permits generally require evidence of a specialist diagnosis and a specialist review within an unstated period.

    Victorian Department of Health — Stimulants for ADHD or narcolepsy - permit requirements

  4. 2026-01-08

    Department of Health interstate prescriptions page last updated, confirming that Schedule 8 prescriptions from AHPRA-registered practitioners in other states may be dispensed at Victorian pharmacies, and that practitioners in Victoria must meet all Victorian requirements including permits even where the prescription will be dispensed interstate.

    Victorian Department of Health — Schedule 8 poisons and interstate prescriptions

  5. 2026-02-03

    The Victorian Government announced funding to train an initial 150 GPs to diagnose and treat ADHD in adults and children aged 6 and over, describing it as a proposed change with stakeholder consultation still to begin. The RACGP publicly welcomed the announcement the same day.

    Premier of Victoria — Media release announcing funding for GP ADHD training (cite by title, not by URL slug)

  6. 2026-02-04

    The RANZCP Victorian Branch and RACGP Victoria issued a joint statement opposing the announced Virtual Emergency Department ADHD prescribing measure on clinical safety grounds, and restated the operative rule that a GP prescribing a stimulant for ADHD must hold a valid permit and have a co-management arrangement with the diagnosing specialist.

    RANZCP Victorian Branch and RACGP Victoria — Joint statement on the Virtual ED ADHD prescription scheme

  7. 2026-02-16

    Department of Health 'Warrants for restricted Schedule 4 medicines' page last updated. It lists five categories of restricted Schedule 4 medicine requiring a departmental warrant; ADHD medicines are not among them.

    Victorian Department of Health — Warrants for restricted Schedule 4 medicines

  8. 2026-07-01

    Current versions of both instruments commenced: the Act at version 145 and the Regulations at version 021. Neither creates any ADHD-specific GP pathway. The Act contains no reference to ADHD at all, and the Regulations refer to attention deficit disorder only in the reg 10(3) paediatrician and psychiatrist exemption.

    Victorian Government (legislation.vic.gov.au) — Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Regulations 2017 (Vic), Version 021

  9. 2026-08-03

    Department of Health 'ADHD care in general practice' page last updated. It states 150 GPs will complete training across September and October 2026, that successful applicants were informed in late July 2026, that only the RACGP training will initially be recognised, that adults will be able to access the Virtual Emergency Department service from September 2026 while it is currently available for children under 18, and that the service is a safety net rather than a replacement for routine ADHD care. No supply duration is stated.

    Victorian Department of Health — ADHD care in general practice

Available across Australia by telehealth.

Is Seen right for you?Compare all states