B.C. to consolidate medical regulatory colleges in effort to modernize healthcare professions
Credit to Author: Stephanie Ip| Date: Wed, 27 Nov 2019 20:55:42 +0000
A major overhaul of how B.C. health professionals are regulated is coming, the B.C. government announced Wednesday.
The goal is to modernize oversight of the various health professions across the province, said Health Minister Adrian Dix.
Dix, along with official Opposition health critic Norm Letnick and health critic Sonia Furstenau, shared details of the proposed changes on Wednesday, one of which would be to consolidate many of the regulatory colleges that oversee various areas of healthcare. Currently there are 20 regulatory colleges; the province hopes to reduce this number to five to improve efficiency.
“We want to improve patient safety and public protection by better supporting health-care professionals and the colleges that regulate them,” Dix said.
“These changes will help ensure health professions are regulated more thoroughly and transparently, so that they are providing British Columbians the best care when they need it most.”
A steering committee consisting of Dix, Letnick and Furstenau are now seeking input into the proposed changes.
Those include ensuring colleges prioritize public interest and patient safety, improving effectiveness of regulatory colleges and ensuring boards are appointed based on merit and competence, streamlining the regulation of new professions and increasing transparency in the public complaints and disciplinary process.
The public is invited to share their feedback via an online survey or by email with the subject head “Feedback – Regulating Health Professionals” to proregadmin@gov.bc.ca.
More to come.