Canada - World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe

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Health systems in transition Canada
enforce, much less regulate, quality standards. Although interprofessional care
has become a desired objective among governments, health care organizations
and provider groups, there remain a number of barriers to implementation,
including segregated education and training and institutional arrangements
concerning remuneration and malpractice (Lahey & Currie, 2005; HPRAC,
2008).
2.8.3 Registration and planning of human resources
Due to provincial jurisdiction over health human resources, there is no single,
national system of registration and planning of human resources in Canada
(Wranik, 2008). The RCPSC, for example, is not a licensing body even though
it sets standards for specialist medical education in Canada and is responsible
for certifying specialists. Physicians certified by the RCPSC are not required to
be registered as members of the RCPSC. While the Health Council of Canada
provides high-level analyses of health human resource issues at a pan-Canadian
level, P/T governments are ultimately responsible for the regulation of the
professions and human resource planning.
In an effort to facilitate greater collaboration on a pan-Canadian basis,
the F/P/T Conference of Deputy Ministers of Health created the Advisory
Committee on Health Delivery and Human Resources (ACHDHR) in 2002.
In 2005, the ACHDHR created a framework with the following three key
objectives, subsequently endorsed by F/P/T ministers of health (ACHDHR,
2007; Dumont et al., 2008):
• avoid the risks and duplication associated with the current jurisdiction-byjurisdiction
approach to human resources planning;
• overcome barriers to implementing system design including population
needs-based planning; and
• increase health workforce planning capacity.
In response to concerns about how best to pursue health workforce
self-sufficiency in response to both the perception and the reality of shortages
in all jurisdictions, the ACHDHR also conducted a human resource study
on behalf of F/P/T governments (ACHDHR, 2009). To date, there has been
no major evaluation conducted on the changes precipitated by ACHDHR’s
initiatives.