The standards of health care colleges may provide that professionals who refuse to provide specific kinds of care based on moral or religious grounds “must” provide patients with effective referrals to other health-care providers. Such standards may be in the…
For colleges under BC’s Health Professions Act that have had the Health Professions Review Board reverse complaint dismissals by the registrar, based on an inadequate investigation of an “objectively” serious matter, the issue as whether the Review Board owes deference…
In June, Lisa C. Fong and Angie Westmacott, Q.C., co-chaired a CLE session on self-regulating professions, where they, as well as Rebecca Durcan and Katrina Haymond, identified a number of ongoing, general trends in professional regulation: public skepticism about self-regulation;…
Under B.C.’s Health Professions Act, some inquiry committees will issue letters of criticism to resolve complaints (under HPA s. 33(6)(b)) — letters that do not constitute formal disciplinary measures, like reprimands, but nonetheless warn registrants that their conduct is substandard, based…
Inquiry or investigation committees of self-regulating professions may wish to assess the extent they provide robust reasons when dismissing public complaints against registrants. Such an awareness should not be isolated to regulators whose complainants have a statutory right to reviews of…