Registration Renewal will begin on February 24, 2023
A Renewal Information Package has been sent to current registrants to help prepare for renewal in early February. Here is a link for your convenience: 2023 Registration Renewal Information.
Online registration renewal is a fast and easy process. It is important for registrants to ensure that their practice and registration information is accurate and kept up to date in order to fulfill the requirement under Bylaw s. 60. This allows the College to keep accurate registrant information readily and publicly available to meet its mandate to protect the public.
Registrants must ensure they have valid active-practising full registration with the College to practise Traditional Chinese Medicine in BC. Student registrants must ensure they have valid student registration with the College to participate in clinical training at recognized TCM schools.
Additional Information:
Updated Practice Standard on Consent to Treatment
The College has received the following two questions concerning consent to treatment a number of times we are providing the answers here.
1. Is there an age of consent for treatment in British Columbia?
No. The BC Infants Act does not specify a minimum age for consent to treatment. Registrants often approach the College for guidance regarding the circumstances under which a minor, often a teenager, may give or withhold consent for medical treatment. In British Columbia, a minor means any person who has not reached the age of 19.
A patient need not be 19 in order to give consent to medical treatment. The concept of maturity has become the principal factor in determining a minor’s capacity to consent to their medical treatment.
The capacity of a minor is determined by assessing the extent to which the minor’s physical, mental, and emotional development will allow for a full appreciation of the nature and consequences of the proposed treatment, including the refusal of such treatment.
2. Is it mandatory for registrants to have the patient sign the Consent to Treatment form?
While documenting consent is mandatory, having a consent to treatment form is not mandatory. A complete clinical record should contain documentation that informed consent has occurred, whether the consent has been given orally or in writing by the patient.
It is important that consent be informed by a meaningful dialogue between the practitioner and the patient. A signed form is simply evidence of informed consent. The actual consent is the dialogue that occurs between the practitioner and the patient. If a patient is asked to sign a form without having had the discussion with the practitioner, then the practitioner has not managed risk.
Once the dialogue is complete and the patient has provided informed consent, the practitioner can document this in the record. For risk management purposes, practitioners could use a comprehensive and credible Consent to Treatment form signed and dated by the patient (or legal guardian) to strengthen its credibility.
If you have other questions about this practice standard, please do not hesitate to email the College via [email protected]
Have Questions about the Quality Assurance Program (QAP) or the Practice Support Program (PSP) within it? Resources and Support are Available!
Unlike the inquiry and discipline processes—engaged after harm has potentially occurred—the QAP is a preventive program that attempts to minimize risk of harm to the public. Therefore, the QAP is an integral part of fulfilling CTCMA’s public protection mandate.
The QAP webpage was updated in December 2022. We encourage registrants to navigate through the new QAP webpage and become familiar with the information available there. The Practice Support Program (PSP) is part of the QAP. Since its development, pilot-testing, and now implementation stages, the College would like registrants to plan their continuing development in a way that most benefits their practice—their patients/clients.
After reading the Quality Assurance Program Handbook, registrants with questions about the QAP and/or PSP or having difficulty completing the PSP forms are invited to contact the College’s Practice Support staff for additional guidance.
The Quality Assurance Committee has made completing the Self-Reflective Assessment a mandatory requirement in the QAP for QA cycles that began April 1, 2022 or later. Registrants are therefore expected to complete their professional continued learning according to the steps outlined in the Practice Support Program (PSP) in each 2-year cycle. Please note that the ethics requirement needs to be met and that a minimum of 50 CEs is acquired per cycle.
How do I arrange for QAP/PSP consultation?
Requests for PSP Consultation can be made by email or telephone. Please make sure you include the information below in your email and/or voice message so we can respond in a timely and comprehensive manner:
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your name (registration number and professional designation if applicable)
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specific question(s)
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email or/and phone number
To reach us:
Email [email protected].
Phone (604) 742-6563 extension 5
Toll-free 1-855-742-6563
Board Members Elected for 2023-2025
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Jennifer Jianying Gao (re-elected)
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Peggy Pei Yu Yu
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Martin Chia-Lung Ma
The Board of Directors provides leadership for carrying out the College’s mission to serve and protect the public interest by regulating and advancing safe, ethical, and quality traditional Chinese medicine practice in British Columbia. The Board is accountable to the public through the Ministry of Health.These three Boa
rd members, elected from among College registrants, will provide valuable insight and depth to the work of the College, alongside the six public Board members and three other registrant members continuing with their terms.
Dr. Jennifer Gao will be familiar to most of you. She has been a CTCMA registrant since 2005 and brings to the Board more than 20 years of clinical practice experience in both China and Canada. She has been a TCM educator for well over a decade, teaching at Kwantlen Polytechnic University and Tzu Chi International College of TCM in Vancouver. We are appreciative of Dr. Gao’s decision to stand for re-election and happily add that she has been re-elected as Vice Chair for the 2023-2025 term.
Ms. Peggy Yu is new to the Board and comes to us as a registered acupuncturist and clinical counsellor. She has particular interests in providing services to outpatient substance abuse programs and working with law enforcement in the victim services field. She is a strategic thinker comfortable in Mandarin, Cantonese and English. She has lectured locally on TCM jurisprudence and looks forward to supporting the College through the lens of public interest.
Mr. Martin Ma, our second first-time Board Member, brings more than 14 years of clinical experience as a registered acupuncturist, and served as well on the board of a professional TCM association. With administration skills, and a background with an educational institution, Mr. Ma has also worked on technology front. He looks forward to putting his background to use with the Board, and to furthering his commitment to serving the public interest.
We are further pleased to advise that public Board member Dr. Peter Stevenson-Moore has been re-elected as Board Chair. Dr. Stevenson-Moore is a recognized leader in the area of oral oncology and was first appointed to the CTCMA Board in 2017. Much of BC’s progress and treatment success in this specialty stems from his talent and leadership. His role with the CTCMA Board provides him with the opportunity to better appreciate the regulatory challenges faced by a profession other than dentistry and to develop inter-disciplinary collaboration with other healthcare providers in BC.
Finally, we’d like to thank outgoing Board members Dr. Kimberley Anne Schneberk and Dr. Weidong Yu for their dedicated service. These outgoing Board members have contributed a great deal over the course of their respective terms and their service has been invaluable.
The official results of the election may be viewed here.
For further information on the CTCMA Board, click here.