Regulation
2009 promises to be a major turning point for the Shiatsu Society and Shiatsu practitioners. At last all our years of work towards regulation are bearing fruit, and our mandate from our membership to be part of this process has been fulfilled. The new regulation body for Complementary Health practitioners, the Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council (CNHC) has finally been set up, and its register is now live, as the CNHC press release below proclaims.
REGULATION LATEST: November 2009
Shiatsu has now been officially accepted onto the CNHC register. Shiatsu Society practitioner members will soon be able to register with the CNHC online, via the Members' Area of the Shiatsu Society Website. The Shiatsu Society has been officially recognised by the CNHC as a verifier of Shiatsu practitioner qualifications.
VOLUNTARY REGISTER FOR COMPLEMENTARY HEALTHCARE
The Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council opened its new register on 19th January 2009 which means for the first time in the UK, members of the public who use a range of complementary healthcare services will be able to check that their practitioner is registered with an independent, and robust voluntary registration body.
With more than 150,000 complementary healthcare practitioners in the UK and an estimated 1 in 5 people using complementary disciplines, the CNHC has been formed to enhance public protection by setting standards for registration. The CNHC kitemark (above) will be established as the hallmark of quality for the sector. Over time, the general public and those who commission the services of complementary healthcare practitioners will be able to choose practitioners with confidence, by looking for the symbol.
Based on substantial preliminary activity undertaken by the Prince’s Foundation for Integrated Health and with the help of a range of complementary healthcare practitioners, the CNHC was founded in April 2008. The Department of Health has consistently supported the CNHC throughout its start-up period and is committed to establishing the CNHC as the national voluntary register in the complementary healthcare field.
Ben Bradshaw, Minister of State for Health, said: “I welcome the opening of the Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council (CNHC) register. Now that the Council is open for business, there will be a single voluntary registration body encompassing a wide range of complementary and alternative therapies, to which the public can turn for help.
“Members of the public who use these therapies will be able to check whether the practitioner they’re seeing is registered with the CNHC. If they are, they have the reassurance of knowing that they have had to meet minimum standards of qualification and that they have signed up to a rigorous code of conduct. Practitioners too will benefit by increased public confidence.
“Public safety is paramount. Registration, whether voluntary or statutory, is about protecting patients, and I am pleased to see this important milestone in voluntary registration. People should always seek their GP’s advice to ensure that any other therapy they use does not conflict with orthodox treatment,” he concluded.
In order for practitioners to successfully register with the CNHC and receive the kitemark, they must have undertaken a programme of education and training which meets, as a minimum, the National Occupational Standards for that profession/discipline or achieved competency to the same level by means of relevant experience and assessment.
The first professions to have the standards in place for registration with the CNHC are massage therapy and nutritional therapy. Throughout 2009, the Register will be opened to further disciplines, as they become ready and wish to register, and include: Alexander technique; Aromatherapy; Bowen technique; Cranial therapy; Homeopathy; Naturopathy; Reflexology; Reiki; Shiatsu; and Yoga therapy.
For further information about registration, visit www.cnhc.org.uk
The Prince's Foundation for Integrated Health
What is it?
Prince of Wales Foundation for Integrated Health (POWFIH) was set up by the Prince of Wales Charitable Foundation (POW), a consortium established in 1979 by the Prince of Wales, of over 16 charities and receiving over £100 million per annum. The aim of the FIH charity, which receives over £1,000,000 per annum from the POW Charitable Foundation, is the active promotion, support and facilitation of the integration of complementary healthcare with mainstream medical healthcare. The rationale behind this is provision of more individual choice and access to the full range of therapies, and the resulting empowerment of the population with regard to health and well-being.
Amongst the goals of the POWFIH are promotion of research, education and training, dissemination of information, fundraising and development of a range of models of integrated healthcare provision. It maintains an up-to-date website with much information on all its activities, and useful links: www.fih.org.uk
What is a Federalist Regulatory Structure and how will it affect the Shiatsu Society?
Statutory Regulation was required by the government for the more invasive complementary therapies, such as Acupuncture, Herbalism, Osteopathy and Chiropracty, as there was more apparent potential hazard in mistreatment. Voluntary Self regulation was advised for the ‘safer’ therapies such as Shiatsu, Bowen, Alexander Technique etc. Following a commissioned report by Professor Julie Stone, a federalist structure of self regulation was suggested as the most useful model. This would involve a number of therapies coming together under the umberella of one regulatory body. This would be both economically sound, and provide better safeguard for the public in the long term.
Coming together under one independent regulatory body would ensure some consistency of high standards in all the therapies with regard to training, qualification, registration, insurance, research, auditing, health and safety, infection control, ethical standards and complaints procedures, and criminal records bureau checks. This would ensure the safety of the public and accountability of the complementary healthcare professions to the public.
A three year Regulation Programme has been set up by the FIH, with £900,000 funding from the DOH, to facilitate the complementary therapies to prepare for voluntary self-regulation and to set up an independent representative regulatory body. The FIH provides training, support and some funding. The therapies that have so far joined the programme are as follows: each has presented itself as a unified forum for regulation:
Alexander Technique Voluntary Self-Regulation Group
Aromatherapy Consortium
Bowen Forum
Cranial Forum
Council of Organisations Registering Homeopaths
General Council for Massage Therapy
Reflexology Forum
Reiki Regulatory Working Group
British Council for Yoga Therapy.
The Shiatsu Society and the Regulation Programme
The Shiatsu Society is now part of the regulation program. It hopes that this will help Shiatsu as a therapy to achieve even higher standards of excellence and accountability in practice, and become more readily available through the NHS, have greater opportunity for research and for sharing of information.
Under a Federalist Regulator, the Shiatsu Society would still maintain its own training schools and curriculum and would advise the regulator on its own criteria for practice and registration. However, the regulator would oversee the maintenance of standards and be responsible for registering practitioners and maintaining the register, and this would be the preferred register for all the complementary therapies, that GPs would access for referral. Whether the Shiatsu Society would hand over its register to the regulator, or would still maintain its own register alongside that of the regulator, is not yet clear.
ESF (European Shiatsu Federation) At Work
The approach of direct representation is at last beginning to have an effect as Government's across Europe look to regulate CAM stimulated by European Directive 2005/36/CE, committing countries to the regulation of professions.
Shiatsu
Society (UK). PO Box 4580,
Rugby,
Warwickshire. CV21 9EL tel: 0845 130 4560 fax: 01788 555052