Transforming and Supporting Patient Care - Health Professions ...

389Chapter 16 - Profession of Respiratory TherapyAn Enabling Regulatory FrameworkIn its previous reports to the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, 36HPRAC has made recommendations for an enabling regulatory frameworkfor health professions. It is within this framework that HPRAC is makingrecommendations for the regulation of RTs. The proposed enablingframework will:• Maintain a broad professional scope of practice for RTs under theRespiratory Therapy Act, 1991 and regulations;• Place responsibility for setting appropriate and rigorous standards,limitations and conditions on practice, that could be changed overtime, with the CRTO, and• Require interprofessional collaboration among professions inestablishing standards, limitations and conditions on the performanceof controlled acts, where professions share the same or similarcontrolled acts.In particular, the Minister asked HPRAC to take into account, whencontrolled acts are shared, public expectations for high quality services nomatter which health profession is responsible for delivering care ortreatment. In this case, HPRAC has compared the expertise of theprofessions who are authorized to prescribe oxygen therapy with that ofRTs, and how they participate in collaborative health care teams inproviding safe and effective health care.A key element of HPRAC’s approach is the creation of a new RespiratoryTherapy Standards Committee. This mechanism would allow the CRTO tocollaborate with other health professions whose members prescribe oxygenin determining standards, limitations and conditions on the performance ofthis authorized act by RTs, based on best practices and with a focus onpatient safety.HPRAC’s ConclusionsIn reviewing the proposal to authorize RTs to prescribe oxygen, HPRACwas struck by the recognition of the technical expertise of members of theprofession and their place as central members of health care teams inhospitals and in community settings. HPRAC also noted, however, that therequest for independent prescribing authority was occasioned by RTs’frustration with inadequate or “static” orders from physicians or otherauthorized professionals who prescribe oxygen, which often lead tosuboptimal patient care. Their experience with “chasing orders” hasadvanced this request.36HPRAC, A Report to the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care on the Review of the Scope ofPractice for Registered Nurses in the Extended Class (Nurse Practitioners), March 2008, and anInterim Report to the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care on Mechanisms to Facilitate and SupportInterprofessional Collaboration among Health Colleges and Regulated Health Professionals: Phase II,Part I, September 2008.HPRAC Critical Links January 2009