Hard at Work for Our Profession. What Is ATCMA Doing?

Updates on Government Meetings and ATCMA Work

What has the ATCMA been up to?

In short, a lot!

1. Upcoming AGM and Courses: 

Firstly, make sure you block off Sunday November 30th 9 a.m.-2 p.m. on your calendar! We’ve sent out email notices about this save-the-date information as we work hard behind the scenes to get everything ready. You can attend this live at the Richmond Olympic Oval or online. We’ll be sending registration links soon, so read your emails and follow us on social media (Facebook and Instagram). The morning will be our courses that are open to all TCMs to attend and are free for ATCMA members. One of the courses will answer your questions about how the upcoming HPOA, regulations, and bylaws will affect our TCM profession. If you haven’t already, take that survey before November 21. The other course will be announced soon. Our AGM will be held that day 1-2 p.m.

2. Meeting About HPOA: 

Another meeting time you want to block off is the webinar on Wednesday November 12, 5:30-7:30 p.m. This is a joint association meeting between the ATCMA, the BC Chiropractic Association (BCCA), the RMT Association of BC (RMTBC), and the BC Naturopathic Association (BCND). You need to belong to one of these associations to be able to attend. The meeting is being presented a lawyer who knows the inside-outs (well, as good as is possible, considering no one really fully understands the HPOA!) of the HPOA and she will be answering questions sent in via a survey link we emailed out to our members. Link to that meeting will be sent out soon!

3. Regulations and Restricted Activity:

Lots of talk happening around the loss of our Restricted Activity of prescribing Chinese herbal formulas! When the BC government sent out their proposed new TCM Practitioners and Acupuncturists Regulation early in 2024, ATCMA and the TCM profession at large spoke up in protest of the removal of the Pinyin language (tui na, Qi gong, tai chi) and the Restricted Activity for prescribing Chinese herbs, in addition to the government's (again!) lack of addressing our scope of practice expansion. The ATCMA met several times with the provincial government branch of the Ministry of Health to address our concerns. We also went to Victoria to speak directly to MLAs. Our most recent meetings with the Professional Regulation and Oversight Branch (ProReg) were in September and October. Next week, we’ll be meeting again with the CCHPBC and the Executive Director of ProReg. We’ve been basing our conversations on the legal feedback we received on our Regulations document, as a result of financial collaborations and contributions from several other TCM associations in BC. And on November 30th, at our AGM courses day, we’ll talk more about this (see point #1 above!). Note that we have also brought forward that we SHOULD have the Restricted Activity of "Design a Therapeutic Diet."

4. Compendium of Roles in Team-Based Primary Care document: 

Remember when TCM and Acupuncture were omitted from an important document that goes out across the country to primary care providers? I do! ATCMA worked in collaboration with the lead TCM associations of Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec to remedy that. We put together sections about TCM that will be added and resent soon to those primary care providers.

5. NNHPD and Herb Regulations: 

Next up is our work with the federal government, in particular, the Non-Prescription and Natural Health Products Directorate (NNHPD) branch of Health Canada. This Friday, I met with the NNHPD to hear updates. Their focus right now is red tape reduction as part of the Government of Canada’s efforts to incentivize growth and maintain safety and access to natural health products (NHPs). As a result, they have put a pause on “cost recovery” fees with no set date yet and labelling changes (previously set for June 2025 and now moved to June 2028). ATCMA has been invited to an upcoming meeting on labelling rules, and we’ll be included in more meetings about NHPs because they want practitioner, not just industry, input to guide their decisions. This includes a meeting we attended in June on herbal compounding, and the results of that meeting will come out hopefully before the end of this year, at which time we’ll have the opportunity to provide feedback.

6. BC Healthcare Association Work: 

Every month ATCMA meets with other BC healthcare association leaders. Currently, most of these meetings are focused on the upcoming changes resulting from the HPOA, which will come into effect on April 1, 2026. These meetings sometimes include government departments, including the Health Professions and Occupations Regulatory Oversight Office (HPOROO) and the Allied Health Policy Secretariat (AHPS), so that we can better communicate with you, our members, about issues of concern, and also share our concerns directly with their organizations.  

7. ICBC: 

Every other week we meet with ICBC to address our members’ concerns and discuss updates. We’ve also had periodic meetings with ICBC to discuss their Recovery Network and related documents. ICBC has made positive changes to their Health Care Services Terms, which will soon being changed to the more appropriately named Health Care Billing Terms, as a result of these meetings that have included other involved healthcare associations. ATCMA will also be sharing shortly a document about concerns or questions TCMs have had about ICBC, offering clarification and solutions. And in January ATCMA will present to ICBC’s claim representatives to bust myths about TCM, including that we can address the stress, anxiety, insomnia, and other symptoms that arise as a result of a motor vehicle accident (MVA), and not just pain.

8. March Conference: 

ATCMA is in the early stages of planning a big educational conference for March 2026! Eastern Currents has normally put on their FLOW symposium every March, but they’ve asked to alternate years with us, so we’re going to be putting on our first big weekend-long education conference next year! If you have requests, let us know SOON!