October 29, 2024
Bill 87, the Protecting Patients Act, 2017, provides Colleges with the ability to develop a regulation to address the period of time an individual will be deemed to be a client[1] for the purposes of sexual abuse. Soon after Bill 87 came into force (June 2017), the Client Relations Committee began work on the Sexual Contact with Former Clients Within Five Years Post-Termination of Care policy. This policy was approved for public consultation on March 29, 2018, and the final version of the policy was approved by Council on June 28, 2018. The policy was an interim solution while the CRPO waited for the government to proclaim into force the ability of the Colleges to pass a regulation extending the minimum waiting period in the Regulated Health Professions Act, 1991 (RHPA).
A proposed draft regulation was developed and approved by Council in 2018. The draft was subsequently submitted to the Ministry of Health for consideration. For background information on the proposed regulation, click here.
The Ministry is now accepting feedback on the proposed regulation until December 6, 2024. We would encourage you to register any feedback you have on the proposed regulation by using this link: The College of Homeopaths of Ontario, College of Opticians of Ontario, and College of Registered Psychotherapists and Registered Mental Health Therapists of Ontario Proposed Regulations Related to Protecting Patients Against Sexual Abuse by Members of the Profession (ontariocanada.com)
Any updates regarding the regulation will be communicated with system partners and posted on the CRPO website.
[1] The Regulated Health Professions Act uses the term “patient.” In keeping with the terms common to the profession of psychotherapy, CRPO uses the term “client” instead of “patient.”