Professional Practice, Ethics, and Interprofessional Collaboration
This domain tests judgement: scope of practice, consent, confidentiality, safeguarding, integrity rules, and how you work alongside physiotherapists, dietitians, psychologists, coaches, and analysts. Items usually pose a request that sounds reasonable but crosses a line.
Core obligations
- Scope of practice. Assess, educate, and programme within your competence; diagnose and treat only if licensed to do so. Refer when the presentation exceeds that boundary.
- Informed consent. Explain purpose, risks, data use, and the right to withdraw. Minors require guardian consent, and assent from the athlete.
- Confidentiality and data minimisation. Collect only what you need, store it securely, and share only with explicit consent, or where a legal duty or serious risk of harm applies.
- Safeguarding. Know reporting routes for harassment, abuse, and exploitation, particularly with under-18 players in team houses and online environments.
- Integrity. Match-fixing, betting on one's own competition, and account sharing breach most publisher and league rules. Anti-doping rules apply only where an event adopts them, so check the specific competition regulations rather than assuming either exemption or universal testing.
- Interprofessional collaboration. Clear referral criteria, shared terminology, and defined communication channels prevent both duplication and gaps. Analysts supply performance data; they do not interpret clinical results.
Worked example
A head coach asks for a player's psychological screening scores before a roster decision. Reasoning: the scores were collected for welfare support under a consent that specified the purpose. Disclosing them breaches confidentiality and would likely deter future honest reporting. The correct response is to refuse the raw data, explain the consent terms, and offer a fitness-for-duty opinion limited to what the player agrees to share, such as current availability to train. If there is genuine performance risk, the player is informed and involved in what is disclosed.
Traps that cost marks
- Sharing assessment data because the requester is senior.
- Giving a diagnosis to justify a training decision.
- Treating minors' consent as implied by team membership.
- Assuming esports is outside anti-doping or integrity rules entirely.