Health care workers enter Vancouver General Hospital.Jennifer Gauthier/The Globe and Mail
Good morning,
Eight years ago, Globe reporter Wendy Stueck obtained an internal investigation report into how the College of Dental Surgeons handled allegations of sexually inappropriate comments made by the college’s chief executive.
The report, written by Vancouver lawyer Peter Gall, found the college dealt with the allegations “poorly,” “intended to mislead,” and attempted to “sweep this serous matter under the rug.”
“The public interest mandate of the college is at the heart of its responsibilities,” Mr. Gall wrote in the report, dated Feb. 14, 2018.
“Attempting to suppress or ignore the matter, as the board has done to date, is not only inconsistent with the college’s public interest mandate and ethical obligations, but it is also futile in the era of social media and greater public consciousness towards sexual harassment.”
Adrian Dix, then B.C.’s health minister, asked Harry Cayton to review the administrative and operational practices of the college, and the province’s health professions act.
Cayton’s report found the dental college sometimes put the interests of its members over those of the public, highlighting a case where a patient was sedated to the point of brain injury.
The dentist in that case was not qualified to administer the sedation, and had repeatedly published misleading statements claiming that he was. After its investigation, the CDSBC declined to cancel the dentist’s registration. He was handed only a three-month suspension.
Issued in April, 2019, Cayton’s report recommended sweeping changes to how dentists and other health professionals are regulated.
The recommendations in that report were, in part, the catalyst for comprehensive new regulations governing B.C.’s health-care professionals that take effect Wednesday.
The Health Professions and Occupations Act was passed in November, 2022. It marks the most significant changes to regulatory colleges oversight in the province in about 30 years. It spans 276 pages and contains more than 600 provisions.
The act applies to all health professionals regulated by a professional college, from doctors, surgeons and nurses to dentists, optometrists and dietitians, among others.
Changes include the amalgamation of colleges, new disciplinary procedures and the elimination of the disciplinary appeals process. Board members will be provincially appointed rather than elected by college licensees.
Colleges currently investigate complaints and determine and enforce disciplinary orders.
Beginning Wednesday, colleges will continue to investigate complaints but, upon completion, a new director of discipline appointed by the Minister of Health will strike a three-person tribunal to determine disciplinary action.
The results of all investigations that lead to disciplinary action will be made public, regardless of how serious or minor. It will increase penalties for those found to have breached professional standards, and it will make knowingly publishing false or misleading medical information a punishable offence.
The legislation will also usher in anti-racism standards, stronger penalties for breaches of professional standards, and mandatory vaccination against some infectious diseases as a condition of licensing.
Health care providers and opposition politicians have criticized the province for not consulting with doctors on the legislation, despite the impact on their profession, and have raised concerns of government overreach.
Doctors of B.C., a provincial advocacy organization that represents more than 16,000 health care professionals, has opposed the legislation for years, with primary concerns being the loss of appeal rights and the transition to provincially appointed board members.
Critics say the new disciplinary process deprives medical practitioners of a meaningful appeals process, and that publicly disclosing minor disciplinary actions could unfairly harm practitioners’ reputations.
Adam Thompson, president of Doctors of B.C., said he would not go as far as calling for the legislation to be repealed but wants changes to be made.
He is concerned that the new rules will place an administrative burden on medical professionals and warned that some doctors may no longer want to work in the province, worsening an existing shortage.
“As physicians, we’ve always felt that we have our patients’ care in mind. It’s top of our personal mandates and that’s why we’ve always felt very capable of self-regulating,” Dr. Thompson said, adding there are fears the college will become a “vehicle to enact health care policy rather than protection of the public.”
Health Minister Josie Osborne said the new legislation may continue to evolve after it takes effect this week.
“As we learn, as always, we look at improving legislation and making changes that may need to be made in the future,” she told reporters Monday.
In an earlier interview, she defended the changes.
“It is in the best interest of the public, in the best interest of professionals themselves, that the regulatory environment around them, the supervision and regulation of health care professionals, is done with the utmost professionalism.
“That really is what this new act is about.”
This is the weekly British Columbia newsletter written by B.C. Editor Wendy Cox. If you’re reading this on the web, or it was forwarded to you from someone else, you can sign up for it and all Globe newsletters here.