About Aesthetic Medical Practitioner

Aesthetic Medical Practitioner

Overview

Aesthetic Medical Practitioner (AMP) is an Australian trade magazine and media brand for the aesthetic medicine industry, serving cosmetic doctors, plastic surgeons, dermatologists, aesthetic nurses, clinic owners and the companies that supply them. Published in print and online, it covers clinical technique, devices and skincare, practice business and marketing, and — extensively — the regulation of cosmetic practice in Australia, a subject that has dominated the industry since the reforms of the early 2020s. Its website states that the information it provides is intended for healthcare professionals only, and parts of its content, such as its Schedule 4 treatment material, sit behind a practitioner login. AMP is also the host of COSMEDICON, the boutique aesthetic medicine conference held each March in Sydney, which it has produced since 2018.

The title changed hands at the end of 2025: after a decade under Sydney-based Bella Media, AMP and COSMEDICON were acquired by Prime Creative Media, the Melbourne-headquartered business publisher, a transaction the magazine's own newsletter was reporting by December 2025. When this profile was verified in October 2026, the AMP website was live and current — displaying the date Friday 16 October 2026, carrying recent product and feature journalism, and listing industry events running through 2026 — and its footer confirmed that all content on the site is the property of Prime Creative Media.

History

AMP's publisher traces the operation's roots to CosBeauty Magazine, the cosmetic treatment magazine the title's About page says "has been around since 1998", giving the team, in its words, more than 20 years' experience in the cosmetic, beauty and wellness arenas. CosBeauty was published by Bella Media — its November 2015–January 2016 issue (number 70) lists Bella Media as publisher — and Aesthetic Medical Practitioner was developed as the professional counterpart to that consumer title, written for practitioners rather than patients. The magazine marked its own tenth anniversary in January 2025 with a retrospective, "10 Years of Change", reviewing the decade from 2015 — the year of The Cosmetic Institute scandal — through the Medical Board guidelines of 2016, the breast implant crises of 2017–19, the pandemic, the "cosmetic cowboys" investigations of 2021 and the sweeping cosmetic surgery reforms that commenced on 1 July 2023. An early masthead, from the magazine's tenth issue, shows the founding structure: Michelle Kearney as editor-in-chief, Aimée Rodrigues as editorial director, and Bill Dunk handling distribution and subscription enquiries.

In 2018 the magazine extended into events, founding COSMEDICON, a boutique aesthetic medicine conference held at the InterContinental Sydney Double Bay; its fourth iteration was held in March 2021 and its eighth in March 2025. The conference's founder was Michelle Kearney, with Bill Dunk as chief operating officer of the business. In late 2025 Bella Media sold AMP and COSMEDICON to Prime Creative Media: the title's email newsletter carried the Prime Creative Media acquisition as a headline item in December 2025, and COSMEDICON 2026, held from 5 to 7 March 2026 in Double Bay, was the final conference hosted under Bella Media. At that event Kearney and Dunk were honoured on stage and formally handed over to the new owners after nine years; Prime Creative Media's chief executive, Christine Clancy, attended and committed the company to preserving the conference's character while evolving it, and the conference is to move to the Hyatt Regency Sydney from 2027.

Programming and Content

AMP's editorial coverage is organised on its website under News and Events, Features (spanning business, cosmetic practice, marketing, technology, lifestyle and profiles), and Products & Services (cosmetic treatments, devices, services, skincare and hair restoration). Regulation and compliance are a defining strand: the magazine has covered the Ahpra and Medical Board reforms, advertising restrictions on Schedule 4 injectables, telehealth rules and complaint processes in depth, alongside clinical content such as laser and device launches, injectable techniques and regenerative medicine, and practice-management material on marketing, staffing and selling a clinic. Its tenth-anniversary retrospective illustrates the editorial formula — a chronicle of the industry's defining events, from the 2015 Cosmetic Institute scandal through BIA-ALCL, the 2023 reforms and the semaglutide weight-loss era, written for practitioners whose businesses those events reshaped.

The brand extends well beyond the magazine. AMP publishes a regular email newsletter — its archive shows editions appearing roughly fortnightly through 2025 and into January 2026, covering topics from filler-related vision-loss guidelines to cosmetic advertising compliance — as well as podcasts, an industry events calendar, and the Black Book Directory of suppliers and services. COSMEDICON remains its flagship live property: the 2026 conference programme covered regenerative medicine, weight-loss injectables, complaint handling and an "Industry in Turmoil" panel on Queensland's rules for the purchase and storage of Schedule 4 cosmetic injectables, moderated by past professional-body presidents and including a representative of the regulator, Ahpra.

Audience and Reach

AMP's audience is the professional aesthetic medicine community rather than the public: its own conference reporting describes its delegates as cosmetic doctors, plastic surgeons, dermatologists, aesthetic nurses, clinic owners and trade partners, and its website restricts its information to healthcare professionals. The title does not publish audited circulation or readership figures, and none are claimed here; its LinkedIn page listed about 1,000 followers when checked in October 2026, a modest figure that reflects a narrow, senior professional niche rather than consumer scale. Its standing in the industry is better evidenced by the conference it built: COSMEDICON is described by its publisher as Australia's leading boutique aesthetic medicine conference — the publisher's own description — and the 2026 handover drew tributes from past presidents of the industry's professional colleges, indicating the position the brand holds among the practitioners it serves.

Digital Presence

The title's website, aestheticmedicalpractitioner.com.au, is a full publishing platform: news and features, product announcements (a launch piece for a new cold fibre laser platform was among recent items), an events calendar listing Australian and international aesthetic conferences and workshops, a magazine archive and subscription facility, podcasts, and the Black Book Directory. Registered practitioners can log in for gated professional content, including Schedule 4 treatment material. The brand is active on social media through its COSMEDICON Facebook page and @cosmedicon Instagram account, and its fortnightly eNews is distributed by email, with an archive of editions publicly listed by its email provider, now under Prime Creative Media's account. Following the acquisition, the website's footer and About page were updated to Prime Creative Media branding, while the site's structure and content continued without interruption into 2026.

Ownership and Organisation

Aesthetic Medical Practitioner is owned by Prime Creative Media, which acquired the magazine and the COSMEDICON conference from Bella Media in a transaction reported by the title in December 2025. Prime Creative Media, founded in 2000 and describing itself as Australia's largest independently owned business-to-business media organisation, has its head office at 379 Docklands Drive, Docklands, in Melbourne, with a further office in North Sydney. The location recorded for this listing is Melbourne, reflecting the publisher's head office; the magazine's own team, however, was built in Sydney — its LinkedIn page lists Double Bay, in Sydney's east, as its headquarters, with a small team — and its conference remains a Sydney event, moving to the Hyatt Regency Sydney in 2027. The editor and conference convener is Aimée Rodrigues, who has been with the title since its early issues, when she was editorial director under founding editor-in-chief Michelle Kearney; Kearney, who founded COSMEDICON, and chief operating officer Bill Dunk stepped away at the March 2026 conference after nine years.

Contact and Availability

Aesthetic Medical Practitioner is available by subscription in print through its website, where the magazine archive, newsletter sign-up, podcasts and the Black Book Directory can also be accessed; practitioner registration unlocks gated professional content. COSMEDICON is held annually in March, at the InterContinental Sydney Double Bay in 2026 and the Hyatt Regency Sydney from 2027. The publisher, Prime Creative Media, is headquartered at 379 Docklands Drive, Docklands, Melbourne, Victoria, and can be reached on +61 3 9690 8766. No public business email address is recorded for this listing.