New Rules for Manitoba’s Healthcare Regulatory Bodies

With the new Regulated Health Professions Act (RHPA) in Manitoba, healthcare regulatory bodies will need to start considering how their existing system will track some of the now required information by the new RHPA. There are 22 health-care professions that are government regulated and the rules have recently been updated. The most recent RHPA came into fruition in June 2014. Although all will fall under the Act, each profession will also have its own profession-specific regulations under the RHPA.

Major Changes

Some of the new RHPA has been rewritten and some has been published for just the first time. These updates may require your college to use different functionalities on your license management software, so it’s important to question how the updated act can affect the functions you currently use or many need to start using. The main changes are listed below:

• Part 2: Reserved Acts, focuses on making sure certain acts are performed underspecific circumstances that are limited to certain regulated health professions and members that are competent to do them. Some acts may be even more specific and only apply to members with specialized training.
  • How do you keep track of reserved acts and making sure they’ve reached the requirements?
  • Can you view if that member has completed the necessary exams?
  • How about if their validity to perform the reserved act has been expired?
  • Having this section visible for staff on members’ profiles would make confirming a members’ reserved acts permission to perform easier.
• Part 3, Governance, section 22(1), a college must establish a complaints investigation committee.
  • Can your software organize the staff into groups?
  • Can it keep track of members with complaints and the amount of complaints received?
  • Again, having this function in your software makes reviewing members and complaints made against them quicker.
• Part 4, Registration and Certificate of Practice, section 28 (3) states that certain information must be made available to the public during normal business hours.
  • Does your vendor have a public directory of your members online?
  • Can you control what is shown to the public and what some may want kept in private?
• Part 5, Business Arrangements, sections 58-74 discusses corporation registration and renewals. Some professions may be required to register corporations and make sure it is holding a valid permit. The permit must be issued and then renewed. A permit can also become suspended or canceled.
  • If your college focuses on a profession that is affected, such as pharmacists, chiropractors, etc., you may need to find out if you can include this functionality in your license management software. A feature that may be useful is giving the staff the ability to see the permit status of each corporation, include validity, expiry date, suspension, and cancellation.
• Part 7, Standards of Practice, Code of Ethics, Practice Directions and Continuing Competency Programs, section 87 (1) is dedicated to describing the standards a college must make its continuing competence program.
  • A college must make the process easy for members to submit proof of their continuing competence. This can be done through the software vendor. Alinity has an excellent web client that makes it effortless for members to update their profiles from anywhere.
• Part 8, Professional Conduct, Section 88-134 outlines the process from when a complaint is made and dealt with, who is on the complaints investigation committee, investigation, decisions, hearings, and much more.
  • Does your software have a function to that digitally helps you with this process?
  • Ours is built specifically for the process outlined in this RHPA and other provincial health professions act.

Manitoba, you may have to have some getting used to with the changes in the RHPA, but with the right vendor and software, the transition should be smooth! Contacting your vendor’s support desk can you get the answers your need to whether they can adapt to the needs of the new Manitoba RHPA. Do you need a new license management software? Use our software procurement checklist to compare all potential vendors with the same criteria. Click below: