Saskatchewan Association of Licensed Practical Nurses Voluntarily Adopts New Regulatory Performance Standards
January 13th, 2021, Regina, SK – Today the Saskatchewan Association of Licensed Practical Nurses (SALPN) formally announced that its Council has voluntarily adopted seventeen new Regulatory Performance Standards to guide its regulation of its more than 4000 members, representing the second-largest healthcare profession in the province.
“In 2017, the SALPN chose to abandon our long-standing advocacy responsibilities in order to focus our efforts and resources on the functions delegated by Saskatchewan’s Licensed Practical Nurses Act (2000), namely protection of the public,” said Denise Kominetsky, Chair of the SALPN Council. “With strong processes in place to guide our industry, which is accountable to the Government of Saskatchewan through the Legislative Assembly, we were inspired to meet a higher standard ourselves as the regulatory body.”
“We are in the business of holding professionals accountable to professional standards, so it only makes sense we hold ourselves to the highest standard also,” Kominetsky continued. “We recognize that self-regulation is a structure that could find itself vulnerable to the interests of the profession, so steps need to be taken to ensure the safety of the public comes first.”
The SALPN sees leading by example as one way to inspire the professionals they regulate to do the same. Hence the Council chose to move forward to voluntarily create an official framework for self-regulation.
Because there is currently no formal oversight body in Saskatchewan, SALPN will voluntarily commit to assessing its own performance against the new standards, evaluating the findings, and reporting those back to the provincial government and the people of Saskatchewan. There are currently 27 health-related professions with the authority to self-regulate in Saskatchewan.
There are four key pillars for which the seventeen regulatory performance standards have been developed to support:
- Improving the SALPN’s regulatory performance.
- Increasing accountability and transparency.
- Preserving regulatory focus into the future.
- Strategy development, operational planning and reporting mechanisms.
These seventeen standards will be applied across eight domains, or areas of focus within the organization, from Governance and Information Management to Measuring, Reporting and Improvement.
“Regulation of any profession or industry, including that of Saskatchewan’s LPNs, is for the protection and benefit of all who live in our province and use our healthcare system,” Kominetsky continued. “As consumers of healthcare services, you should receive skilled and ethical care every time you see a health care professional.”
“Today’s announcement marks another step in the SALPN’s ongoing efforts to not only improve regulatory effectiveness but to increase our transparency and accountability to each other and our patients, while ensuring SALPN is firmly fixed within a regulatory focus.”
The SALPN would like to credit and thank the health regulatory authorities in Ontario for sharing their work in the development of a Performance Measurement Framework in their province, which has made this work possible for SALPN.
For more information or for media interviews:
Lynsay Nair, SALPN Executive Director 306-537-0472
About SALPN: The Saskatchewan Association of Licensed Practical Nurses regulates Licensed Practical Nurses in Saskatchewan through the Licensed Practical Nurses Act 2000. Anyone practicing as an LPN in Saskatchewan must hold a current Practicing License or Graduate Practical Nurse License, issued by the SALPN.
The Act authorizes Practical Nursing to be a self-regulating nursing profession and establishes a Council to oversee the regulation of the profession. The SALPN Council consists of five elected LPNs, three government appointed public representatives and the Executive Director, who is hired by Council.
www.salpn.com.
