The face of mental health services in Ontario could permanently change if its governing body adopts proposals that some psychologists are calling damaging and drastic.
The College of Psychologists and Behaviour Analysts of Ontario (CPBAO) released a 47-page document titled Amendments to Registration Regulation 193/23 under the Psychology and Applied Behaviour Analysis Act, 2021, which outlines its proposed changes to the psychology profession and encourages the public to provide feedback online.
Some of the key changes, according to the college’s website, include removal of the four-year work experience requirement for Master’s-level candidates and elimination of the oral examination.
CPBAO Registrar and Executive Director Tony DeBono explains the college’s rationale, “The duties of the College are to work with the minister of health to ensure a sufficient supply of competent regulated health professionals, and to serve and protect the public interest when carrying out its objects.”
Dr. Natalie Michel, lead of media and messaging for the Psychology Advocacy Network, with years of extensive training in the field explains, “The college is reducing the amount of training that they are requiring psychologists to complete prior to independent practice.”
She emphasizes the danger that could be created if training and exam requirements are reduced.
She worries there’s a potential some mental health providers won’t be “quite knowledgeable or competent,” and that could lead to “a very serious impact on clients, especially we know, for example, misdiagnoses occur more regularly with less training.”
Michel says misdiagnoses can lead to a person receiving the wrong treatment or medication, and in severe cases, could lead to self-harm.
When she first heard about the proposed changes, she was surprised and confused. A psychologist and board member at the Ontario Psychological Association (OPA), Dr. Katie Stewart, shared a similar sentiment, “I was, I think, like many of my colleagues, quite shocked.”
She believes the changes are meant to encourage more psychologists to get registered.
“Instead of looking at alternative ways to get more psychologists, and the OPA had lots of ideas on how to do that, they’re kind of saying, ‘let’s just change the definition of what a psychologist is.’”
The CPBAO states that the recommendations are “to modernize the College’s registration process.”
However, the OPA believes these “sweeping” changes are “being done under the guise of increasing the number of psychologists in Ontario.”
On the OPA website the association states it’s time for a “wake-up call for Ontario” as it notes “the proposed changes would slash training by up to 75 per cent.”
Stewart fears that if they were to implement lower standards, “who’s to say they’re not going to do the same thing for doctors, nurses [or] social workers?”
She highlights the pressing issue, “I think that the question really is … how do we do this in a way that isn’t going to jeopardize public safety and isn’t going to negatively impact Ontarians and their mental health.”
The public can share their comments on the proposed changes through the CPBAO’s survey until Dec. 9. The survey can be found here.
