Operating Theatre Technician (ANZSCO 311214)

On the Regional Occupation List

From the official Home Affairs skilled occupation lists, as at 2026-08-12. Lists change at each government update — always confirm on the official page before acting.

Which lists is Operating Theatre Technician on?

ROL — Regional Occupation List. Occupations on the ROL are limited to the regional provisional visas — mainly the Skilled Work Regional 491 and Skilled Employer Sponsored Regional 494.

Visas this occupation can access

Being on a list makes the occupation nominatable for these visas — each visa still has its own requirements (points, age, English, a positive skills assessment, and for sponsored visas a willing employer or state).

Processing priority

Operating Theatre Technician is a healthcare occupation under Directions 121 and 122 (ANZSCO Unit Group 3112, Medical Technicians). Since 19 September 2026, skilled visa applications by a primary applicant in this occupation are in the first group processed: for the 482 under Direction 121, and for the permanent and provisional skilled visas, including the 186, 189, 190, 491 and 494, under Direction 122.

Priority changes the order in which lodged applications are looked at, not whether they are granted. Who is invited to apply through SkillSelect is decided separately. See all 202 occupations in the priority sectors.

Skills assessment

A positive skills assessment for Operating Theatre Technician comes from:

What the assessment actually involves

VETASSESS assesses Operating Theatre Technician as a Group D occupation, a lower qualification bar than the Group E codes elsewhere in the medical-technician cluster: its own page states the requirement as a qualification comparable to an AQF Certificate III or higher, with no stated field-of-study requirement on the base pathway. Group D also allows employment before or after the qualification, unlike Group E's post-qualification-only rule.

Where these applications come unstuck

Despite the lower qualification bar, this code's visa reach is the narrowest in the medical-technician cluster: Regional Occupation List only, reaching the 407 training visa and the 491/494 regional-provisional visas — no Skills in Demand visa, no Employer Nomination, no state-nomination route at all. An applicant weighing this code against Medical Technicians nec, which reaches every visa in the cluster, is comparing a lower qualification bar against a materially narrower set of outcomes.

An honest read on this pathway

The pathway genuinely works for a training or regional-provisional plan and genuinely does not work for anyone whose plan depends on employer sponsorship or state nomination. Whether operating theatre technician experience can instead be nominated under Medical Technicians nec is not settled by VETASSESS's own published pages — see that code's own entry for what its suitable-occupations list actually says.

VETASSESS assesses qualifications and employment separately. Both need documentation that agrees with itself. The Employment History Builder and Document Vault organise each trail before you lodge.

Talk it through with a registered agent

Whether nominating Operating Theatre Technician is your best route depends on your points, experience evidence and timing — exactly what a MARA-registered agent works through in an initial consultation. Describe your situation once through Migratio and compare real consultation quotes from registered agents, free.

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