Course Fees

Diploma of Medical Herbalism = $7,200 (NZ Dollars)

Diploma of Medical Herbalism = 4 stages, each costing $1800 

Each stage is paid for separately once the previous stage has been completed.
The total cost for all four stages is $7,200

For New Zealand students, we are also able to offer a payment schedule of $100 per week over 20 weeks ($2,000) for each stage. 

Prerequisites: Diploma of Medical Herbalism students must have completed all the course work for the Certificate in Herbal Medicine before beginning their Diploma studies and note that this rule applies even to people who have previously studied or qualified in one or more natural medicine courses. Also note that, in conjunction with seeing the level of work completed in the Certificate, there is an application process which can include an interview process for prospective Diploma students to ensure their suitability for this intensive course of study with its great goal of learning how to become a successful, safe and effective herbalist.   

The Diploma incorporates:

This is a unique, in-depth, extremely well-resourced Diploma that is designed with the sole purpose of helping to create good, safe and effective practitioners. For more information you can download an outline of our course curriculum here.

The Diploma of Medical Herbalism includes a further 9 comprehensive courses from Paul Bergner, each one containing a series of lectures and supportive literature on subjects that will be entirely relevant to the student wishing to learn how to work with the major issues that present in clinical practice.

Richard Whelan provides a detailed series of lessons on 100 medicinal herbs along with practical and effective approaches to around 100 of the most common conditions found in practice based on real-life cases. Many more lessons on clinical skills proliferate through this course, our student forum and online gatherings provide a dynamic place for further learning and discussion and our Diploma students receive personal mentoring to help them on their learning journey. 

Position on NZQA

We are an independent education provider who are choosing to stay completely clear of the NZQA system and all the many strings that are inevitably attached to getting money from the Government. We are not academics who only see people in the classroom and then somehow decide what subjects have to be learned up to what level, much of which turns out to be completely irrelevant to clinical practice. Our system of education is strongly influenced by the old ways of training, we value such things as experiential learning, apprenticeship, hands-on learning, a wide range of reading and influences, and mentoring. We recognise that what needs to be known, first and foremost, is how to get good results with actual people in the actual world. 

Also note that, whilst the beginning parts of our course are standardised, the further the student goes along their learning journey, the more their work needs to be individualised in order to meet their unique needs in how to best become a good herbalist. You cannot offer such a non-standardised course under NZQA, and nor would we want to. Whilst it may be tempting to take advantage of the easy access to a student debt that is provided for under the NZQA system, you still have to pay it back. Our successful graduates will finish their Diploma debt-free and be ready to start the next stage of their journey into professional practice.

Prospective students should also understand that there is zero Government support or any other kind of subsidy for the herbal practitioner in practice in New Zealand, or any other country in the world for that matter. They also need to understand that there is no such support likely to start happening in the future. Our own herbal association has been trying to get it for over a hundred years but no-one in Government is interested in funding or supporting herbalists, why would they, such a move would be seen as going against the mainstream health system. 

All kinds of people with all kinds of problems come to a herbalist. They know they will have to pay for their treatment, they know that they are going to get zero Government, or ACC, or insurance money, but they come anyway because they trust it will be worth it. A good practitioner can thrive in this work, not because they get any handouts, but because they know how to get good results with people.