An approach to assuring continuing fitness to practise based on right-touch regulation principles

Background

This paper addresses the question of how the public can be assured that their health or care professional is always fit to care for them. More specifically, it looks at the role that regulation plays in supporting registrants to demonstrate that they are fit to practise throughout their practising lives.

In this paper, we set out some broad guidance for regulators in the development and ongoing improvement of their continuing fitness to practise frameworks. We hope it will support regulators in taking a thoughtful and flexible approach to the challenge of assuring continuing fitness to practise.

Our Right-touch approach

We used the principles of right-touch regulation to develop an approach to assuring continuing fitness to practise that is both proportionate and targeted. We suggest that regulators identify and quantify the risks presented by the professions they regulate in order to develop continuing fitness to practise mechanisms that provide them with the levels of assurance they need to mitigate these risks. We hope this paper will support regulators in taking a thoughtful and flexible approach.

We begin by defining the problem – setting out the purpose and scope of continuing fitness to practise. We go on to look at the sorts of risks associated with continuing fitness to practise, and how quantifications of risk should influence the design of continuing fitness to practise mechanisms to ensure that they are proportionate and targeted. Finally, we explain how, by taking into account both reliability and risk, these mechanisms can achieve what they were designed to achieve.