CCO Circulation for Feedback: Draft Quality Assurance Amendments to Guideline G-014: Delegation, Assignment and Referral of Care and New Draft Guideline G-015: Virtual Care – June 29, 2023

The College of Chiropractors of Ontario (CCO) is distributing two documents to stakeholders, including members, for feedback.

Draft Amendments to Guideline G-014: Delegation, Assignment and Referral of Care

CCO is distributing draft amendments to Guideline G-014: Delegation, Assignment and Referral of Care for feedback.

Guideline G-014 provides protocols for members assigning certain clinical procedures that are in the public domain (i.e., not controlled acts) to a staff person or other health professional as part of a chiropractic plan of care. These protocols include that the chiropractor is on-site to provide any direction or supervision of an assigned clinical procedure. However, CCO has recently received a number of complaints from the public that they have gone through a chiropractic plan of care of assigned care to a staff person or other health professional, with little or no communication or interaction with the chiropractor.

CCO is proposing amendments to Guideline G-014, indicated in underline on page 3 of the guideline, to require direct communication between the chiropractor and patient at each visit that is part of a chiropractic treatment plan. These amendments are intended to facilitate communication between the member and patient and ensure that the patient has an opportunity to interact with and ask questions of their chiropractor in instances where certain care is assigned to another individual as part of a chiropractic plan of care.

Please review the draft amendments to Guideline G-014: Delegation, Assignment and Referral of Care and provide any feedback through the portal by August 31, 2023.

Draft Guideline G-015: Virtual Care

CCO is distributing a new Draft Guideline G-015: Virtual Care for feedback.

This draft guideline, once approved, is intended to replace the temporary guidance on telecare communicated during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Draft Guideline G-015: Virtual Care sets the expectations for a member providing chiropractic care using a virtual or telecommunication platform, where the patient is not in-person. The draft guideline includes expectations related to: registration requirements, clinical competency, limitations of virtual care, standards and expectations of performing virtual care, professional liability or insurance requirements, record keeping and billing practices, and jurisdictional considerations.

Please review Draft Guideline G-015: Virtual Care and provide any feedback through the portal by August 31, 2023.

CCO’s Quality Assurance Committee will review all feedback from stakeholders, including members, as part of its deliberations before making any recommendations to Council. Thank you for participating in the self regulation of the chiropractic profession in Ontario.