Traditional, complementary and integrative medicine
DHA is renaming this category while it licenses it. The exam tool says TCIM, the service pages say TCAM, the fee selector says T&CM, and one title is still called TCAM-Trainee. All fifteen titles are below with the exam each one actually takes.
Why the search results disagree
The category is mid-rename, and DHA has not finished. Which name you meet depends on which page you land on, and searching for the wrong one hides half the material.
The Mode of Exam per Specialty tool lists the category as Traditional Complementary and Integrative Medicine (TCIM). The service pages still say Traditional & Complementary & Alternative Medicine, and the fee selector on every one of them says T&CM. The CBT Assessment Guideline uses TCIM. Same category, same portal, three spellings.
Inside the TCIM list on the lookup, the trainee grade is published as TCAM-Trainee. The rename has reached the category label but not every title under it.
Two circulars — 30 April and 11 June 2026 — are titled as a survey on Traditional, Complimentary, and Integrative Medicine Services (TCIM), DHA's own spelling, while the body invites all healthcare professionals (TCAM and other medical specialties). Both are surveys; neither changes a requirement. They are the only two matches for “Traditional” in a 1,572-item circular archive, and searches for “TCAM” and “Complementary” return nothing.
Version 1.3, effective July 2025, names the category as Traditional Complementary and Alternative Medicine (TCAM Practitioner) and records in Appendix 1 that Ayurveda Massage and Chinese Massage roles require supervision by a qualified TCAM practitioner.
Sources: DHA Sheryan — Mode of Exam per Specialty · DHA — Manual for Licensing Healthcare Professionals v1.3, effective 18/07/2025
Checked 29 August 2026. DHA is renaming this category and may activate or de-activate an assessment without updating its own guideline. Check your own title in the live lookup before booking.
All fifteen titles
Every title in the category, exactly as DHA's own selector spells it, with the exam mode the lookup returned for it on the day. Where a computer-based test applies, the specification is DHA's published one.
| Title, as DHA publishes it | Exam mode | Code | Duration | Questions | Fee | Pass score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Acupuncture Practitioner | Computer Based Testing (CBT) | PAC6092 | 2 hours | 100 | USD 180 | 60% |
| Ayurveda Massage Therapist | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Ayurveda Practitioner | Oral Assessment | PAY5852 | 2 hours | 100 | USD 180 | 60% |
| Chinese Massage Therapist | No Exam is Required | — | — | — | — | — |
| Chiropractor Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Herbal/Oriental Medicine Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Hijama Therapist | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Homeopathy Practitioner | Computer Based Testing (CBT) | PHO5832 | 2 hours | 100 | USD 180 | 60% |
| Naturopathy Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Osteopathy Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| TCAM-Trainee | No Exam is Required | — | — | — | — | — |
| Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Traditional Japanese Medicine Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Traditional Korean Medicine Practitioner | Oral Assessment | — | — | — | — | — |
| Unani Practitioner | Computer Based Testing (CBT) | PUN6062 | 2 hours | 100 | USD 180 | 60% |
Sources: DHA Sheryan — Mode of Exam per Specialty
Checked 29 August 2026. DHA is renaming this category and may activate or de-activate an assessment without updating its own guideline. Check your own title in the live lookup before booking.
What you are licensed to do
There is exactly one TCAM-specific regulatory document, and it is dated August 2011 — fourteen years older than everything else DHA publishes on this category. It is worth reading for what it does not contain as much as for what it does.
The document covers Ayurveda, Chiropractic Medicine, Homeopathy, Naturopathic Medicine, Osteopathic Medicine, Therapeutic Massage, Traditional Chinese Medicine and Unani Medicine. It names none of Acupuncture, Hijama, Herbal/Oriental Medicine, or Japanese and Korean Traditional Medicine — all of which the licensing system now lists as separate titles.
Practitioners may not treat acute or critical conditions needing emergency care, may not treat communicable diseases, and may not perform surgery, inoculations, injections or blood withdrawal — cupping and ozone therapies excepted under special permission. They may prescribe only within their own specialty, may not dispense from their own clinic without DHA permission, and may not sign documents that statutorily require a registered medical doctor.
The document states a practitioner may make a diagnosis according to the science and philosophy of their own field of training, and obliges them to refer to a physician whenever there is doubt about the diagnosis or the response to therapy. Scope may not be expanded into approaches the practitioner has no training or experience in.
Chiropractic, Osteopathic and Naturopathic practitioners are additionally barred from treating infectious diseases. Ayurveda, Naturopathy, Osteopathy and Traditional Chinese Medicine are stated not to include the use of prescription medications.
The document requires practitioners to meet the Continuous Professional Development requirements for licensure and the standards of professional practice and behaviour expected of all licensees.
Sources: DHA — Scope of Practice for Traditional, Complementary and Alternative Medicine Practitioners (August 2011)
Checked 29 August 2026. DHA is renaming this category and may activate or de-activate an assessment without updating its own guideline. Check your own title in the live lookup before booking.
What it costs
There is no TCAM or TCIM fee schedule. The category is priced with nurses and allied health throughout, which is the single most useful thing to know before budgeting.
Every fee-bearing Sheryan service offers exactly two applicant categories, and the only one that includes this category is “Nurse and Midwife/Allied Health/T&CM”. A TCIM practitioner pays the nurse and allied-health column at every step.
All four TCIM computer-based tests are priced at USD 180 — the lowest of DHA's three exam fees — and all four run two hours with 100 questions and a 60% pass mark. An oral assessment, which most titles in this category take, is AED 250, or AED 2,000 for an urgent slot.
Sources: DHA Sheryan — Get Registered service description
Checked 29 August 2026. DHA is renaming this category and may activate or de-activate an assessment without updating its own guideline. Check your own title in the live lookup before booking.
Recorded, not resolved
Two things in this category do not resolve, and both are recorded as found rather than smoothed over.
The CBT Assessment Guideline publishes a full specification for it — PAY5852, 2 hours, 100 questions, USD 180, 60% pass. The live lookup, queried the same day, returns Oral Assessment for the same title. DHA reserves the right to de-activate an assessment without updating the guideline, which is the likely explanation, but DHA does not say so. The lookup is the live system; check it for your own title before booking anything.
The scope-of-practice document sets no degree, no training-hours figure and no years-of-experience threshold for any discipline, and does not mention examinations or competency assessment at all. Those requirements sit in the PQR, whose published link points at a staging host and whose production copy does not load.
Sources: DHA Sheryan — Mode of Exam per Specialty · DHA — Scope of Practice for Traditional, Complementary and Alternative Medicine Practitioners (August 2011)
Checked 29 August 2026. DHA is renaming this category and may activate or de-activate an assessment without updating its own guideline. Check your own title in the live lookup before booking.
Prepare carefully
TCAM and TCIM return different halves of DHA’s own material. So does T&CM, which is what the fee selector calls it.
Ten of the fifteen titles take an oral assessment. Only three route to a computer-based test on the live lookup.
It contains no fees at all. The category is priced with nurses and allied health on every Sheryan service page.
It covers eight disciplines. Fifteen titles are licensable, and seven of them are not named in it.
Ayurveda Practitioner has a full CBT specification and returns Oral Assessment. The lookup is the live system.
Not permitted from your own clinic unless DHA has specifically allowed it, and prescribing is limited to your own specialty.
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TCAM / TCIM FAQs
Both, right now. DHA's Mode of Exam tool calls the category Traditional Complementary and Integrative Medicine (TCIM); its service pages still say Traditional & Complementary & Alternative Medicine; the fee selector on every one of them says T&CM; and one title inside the TCIM list is still published as TCAM-Trainee. It is one category with a rename in progress, so search both spellings.
It depends on the title. Of the fifteen titles in this category, three route to a computer-based test, ten to an oral assessment, and two need no exam at all. The three CBTs all run two hours with 100 questions, cost USD 180 and pass at 60%.
Acupuncture Practitioner, Homeopathy Practitioner and Unani Practitioner, on the live lookup. The CBT Assessment Guideline also publishes a full specification for Ayurveda Practitioner, but the lookup returns Oral Assessment for that title — both are shown on this page and the lookup is the live system.
USD 180 for a computer-based test, which is the lowest of DHA's three exam fees. An oral assessment, which most titles in this category take, is AED 250, or AED 2,000 for an urgent slot. DHA publishes no dirham equivalent for the USD figure.
No. Every fee-bearing Sheryan service offers exactly two applicant categories, and the only one that includes this category is "Nurse and Midwife/Allied Health/T&CM". A TCIM practitioner pays the nurse and allied-health column at every stage — credentialing, renewal, assessment and activation.
DHA's scope-of-practice document is written mostly as prohibitions: no treating acute or critical conditions needing emergency care, no communicable diseases, no surgery, inoculations, injections or blood withdrawal except cupping and ozone therapies under special permission. Diagnosis is permitted within the science and philosophy of the practitioner's own field, with an obligation to refer to a physician whenever there is doubt.
Because it is from August 2011 and covers eight disciplines, while the licensing system now lists fifteen titles. Acupuncture, Hijama, Herbal/Oriental Medicine and Japanese and Korean Traditional Medicine are all licensable titles that the scope document does not name.
The scope-of-practice document sets no degree, no training-hours figure and no years-of-experience threshold for any discipline, and does not mention examinations at all. Those requirements sit in the PQR, whose published link points at a staging host and whose production copy does not load. We will not guess at a threshold DHA has not published.
Not without permission. The scope document states practitioners are not allowed to sell or dispense any prescribed or advised products or preparations from their own practice clinic unless DHA permits it, and that they may prescribe only within their own specialty.
The Manual for Licensing Healthcare Professionals v1.3 lists Ayurveda Massage and Chinese Massage roles in Appendix 1 as requiring supervision by a qualified TCAM practitioner.
Not that its own circular archive shows. Searching 1,572 circulars returns two matches for "Traditional", both from 2026 and both surveys rather than requirement changes; "TCAM" and "Complementary" return nothing at all. The visible change is terminological, not regulatory.
We can help you identify which of the fifteen titles your qualifications and experience fit, check the live lookup for the exam mode that applies to it, and set out what the scope document permits. DHA makes the licensing decision under its own rules.
Start with your profile
Tell us your discipline, qualification and experience. We will work out which of the fifteen titles your profile fits, check the live lookup for the exam that applies, and set out what the scope document lets that title do.
Disclaimer: UAEHealthPro is an independent consultancy. We are not a government authority and we do not set or administer any DHA assessment. Every figure here is transcribed from DHA’s own published material and dated at the point it appears. DHA is renaming this category and states it may change an assessment without updating its guideline — confirm your own title in DHA’s lookup before booking.
Check the current exam mode for your title