How are complementary health professions regulated in Australia? An examination of complementary health professions in the national registration and accreditation scheme.

OBJECTIVES: This study aims to provide an empirical examination of how complementary medicine practice in Australia is actually regulated under the current national registration model. METHODS: Data was obtained from Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) Annual Reports for the years 2011/12-2014/15 and supplemented by the Chinese Medical Registration Board of Victoria (CMRBV) Annual Reports in 2011/12 for Chinese Medicine complaints. The data analysed includes complaint statistics, stage of closure of complaints and the outcome of complaints concerning Chinese medicine, chiropractic and osteopathy under the National Law. RESULTS: During 2014-2015 the number of complaints per 100 registrants for was highest for the medical board (4.4), while much lower for the chiropractic (1.5), osteopath (0.7) and Chinese medicine (0.5) boards. For conventional boards, 58% of complaints were closed at the assessment stage, while 57%, 29% and 16% of complaints to the osteopath, Chinese medicine and chiropractic boards respectively were closed at the assessment stage. The decision to suspend or cancel registration of health professionals was 17% from the Chinese medicine board, 14% from the Osteopathy Board, 1.5% from the chiropractor board and 0.6% from the medical board. CONCLUSION: It appears that complementary medicine practitioner regulation works at least as well as conventional regulation, and at most complementary medicine boards take a stricter interpretation of misconduct though more research would need to be undertaken to state this definitively. Our findings indicate that the public are using the statutory complaint mechanisms available to them with respect to the three CM groups.

The Single Graduate Medical Education (GME) Accreditation System Will Change the Future of the Family Medicine Workforce.

BACKGROUND: Due to the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME)/American Osteopathic Association (AOA) single-accreditation model, the specialty of family medicine may see as many as 150 programs and 500 trainees in AOA-accredited programs seek ACGME accreditation. This analysis serves to better understand the composition of physicians completing family medicine residency training and their subsequent certification by the American Board of Family Medicine. METHODS: We identified residents who completed an ACGME-accredited or dual-accredited family medicine residency program between 2006 and 2016 and cross-tabulated the data by graduation year and by educational background (US Medical Graduate-MD [USMG-MD], USMG-DO, or International Medical Graduate-MD [IMG-MD]) to examine the cohort composition trend over time. RESULTS: The number and proportion of osteopaths completing family medicine residency training continues to rise concurrent with a decline in the number and proportion of IMGs. Take Rates for USMG-MDs and USMG-IMGs seem stable; however, the Take Rate for the USMG-DOs has generally been rising since 2011. CONCLUSIONS: There is a clear change in the composition of graduating trainees entering the family medicine workforce. As the transition to a single accreditation system for graduate medical education progresses, further shifts in the composition of this workforce should be expected.

A pediatric diabetes toolbox for creating centres of reference.

INTRODUCTION: ISPAD guidelines recommend age appropriate diabetes education concepts for young patients and their families as well as tools for nutritional management, psychosocial assessment, and psychological advice but their implementation in Europe is presently unknown. METHODS: On the basis of a structured survey among the European SWEET members information on established tools and programs in national languages were analyzed using an extensive literature and desk search. These were differentiated according to five age-groups and five target groups (young people with diabetes, parents, and other close relations, carers in school and nursery, and healthcare professionals). RESULTS: Responses and original tools were received from 11 SWEET countries reflecting the European status in 2011. More or less structured information for parents, close relations, and carers in school or nursery are available in all 11 participating countries. However, only two countries followed the recommendations of having published a structured, curriculum lead, and evaluated program for different age-groups and carers. One of these was evaluated nationwide and funded by the respective National Health Care System after accreditation. In addition a huge variety of creative tools, e.g., booklets, leaflets, games, videos, and material for educating children of different age-groups and their parents are available - but most of them are not linked to a structured education program. CONCLUSIONS: Harmonizing and integrating these materials into quality assured structured holistic national education programs will be an important future task for the ongoing SWEET project. A comprehensive European diabetes educational toolbox is aimed to be published and continuously updated on the SWEET website.

Certification of TB culture and drug susceptibility testing laboratories through the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP).

The RNTCP is implementing the Programmatic Management of Drug Resistant Tuberculosis (PMDT) for detecting and treating drug resistant tuberculosis (DR-TB). Diagnostic services for DR-TB is provided through a network of RNTCP certified Culture and Drug Susceptibility Testing (C&DST) laboratories.This paper describes about the process involved in certification of C&DST laboratories for different technologies used in RNTCP.

A template for spiritual assessment: a review of the JCAHO requirements and guidelines for implementation.

Growing consensus exists regarding the importance of spiritual assessment. For instance, the largest health care accrediting body in the United States, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO), now requires the administration of a spiritual assessment. Although most practitioners endorse the concept of spiritual assessment, studies suggest that social workers have received little training in spiritual assessment. To address this gap, the current article reviews the JCAHO requirements for conducting a spiritual assessment and provides practitioners with guidelines for its proper implementation. In addition to helping equip practitioners in JCAHO-accredited settings who may be required to perform such an assessment, the spiritual assessment template profiled in this article may also be of use to practitioners in other settings.

[The accreditation procedure: An external recognition of quality in public and private health centres in France. ]. / La rocedure d' accreditation: Une reconnaissance externe de la qualite dans les etablissements de sante publics et prives en france.

Since early 1990, the structures and financing of various health systems have been reformed. For the first time, some western Europe countries have admitted that quality insurance within the health system can become a governmental responsibility and, as in the past, simply the responsibility of the professionals and/or the health service administrators. During the last decade of the XXth century, pressure has gradually been increased for governments to become more involved in health system quality. This focus on quality was linked to human safety. In this historical perspective, the emergence of AIDS and the difficulty to control this epidemic, and the consequences of contamination by injection needles have probably played a part in this collective awareness. In this context, quality has become a major concern in Europe.

[Chemical compound safety: typology of competency accreditation for assay centers and analytical laboratories]. / La sicurezza dei composti chimici: tipologie di riconoscimento della competenza per i Centri di saggio e i laboratori di analisi.

The use of chemicals warrants many benefits on which modern society is entirely dependent. On the other hand, the lack of reliable information about the impact of the use of chemicals raises increasing concern. In order to guarantee the safety of chemicals it is mandatory to proceed to risk assessment, which in turn consists of hazard evaluation and exposure estimation. These activities are strictly dependent upon the availability of reliable data and information, produced by, e.g., test facilities, test laboratories and clinical laboratories, the specific competence of which has been properly recognised. All this applies in the pre-marketing phase as well as during the use of chemical substances. In this latter phase it is necessary to carry out an appropriate monitoring of environment, food and, in specific situations, human beings (biological monitoring). In the field of chemical safety, standards, legal instruments and operative instruments are nowadays available. These tools make it possible to assess both the quality of data and the competence of the entities involved in the production of the data themselves.

The anatomy of an OPTI: Part 2. The CORE system. Ohio Osteopathic Hospital Association. Ohio Association of Osteopathic Medical Directors. Ohio Osteopathic Association.

In July 1995, the American Osteopathic Association (AOA) Board of Trustees passed new regulations regarding the accreditation of osteopathic graduate medical education (GME) by establishing the Osteopathic Postdoctoral Training Institutions (OPTI) system. This system must be phased in by July 1999. The principal changes resulting from the OPTI system include establishing requirements for college cosponsorship of GME programs and for the number of residency programs, interns, and residents to be trained by the OPTI. In essence, OPTI is an osteopathic acronym for consortium. Each OPTI must include at least one college of osteopathic medicine (COM) and one AOA-accredited hospital. The OPTIs will be subject to interval AOA inspections and will be required to demonstrate a governing system, mission statement, organizational structure, and the presence of faculty development programs. The first article in this two-part series, published in the October JAOA, provided a general blueprint for OPTI building and presented both positive and negative issues germane to the formation of OPTIs. Part 2 reinforces the considerations outlined in Part 1 by describing the formation of a large OPTI--the Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine (OU-COM) Centers of Osteopathic Regional Education (CORE) system. Key features are described, including the mission statement, organizational structure, committee system, governance, GME programs, operations, and budget.

Health Care Financing Administration--Validation of accreditation surveys of hospitals. Final regulation.

These amendments modify current Medicare regulations dealing with hospitals accredited by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAH) and the American Osteopathic Association (AOA) to restate these regulations more simply and clearly. Specifically, the amendments: (1) provide for consultation with the JCAH or AOA on survey findings prior to placing an accredited hospital under State survey agency monitoring; (2) recognize the JCAH and AOA institutional planning standards for hospitals as equivalent to the Medicare institutional planning requirement; (3) provide for consultation with JCAH and AOA before the Secretary promulgates standards that are higher or more precise than those used by JCAH or AOA; and (4) include reference, in the provision on State agency surveys, to chiropractors, end-stage renal disease treatment facilities, rural health clinics, and physical therapists in independent practice.